Cahill guides Socceroos past Japan

Australia's midfield dynamo Tim Cahill has returned to haunt Japan after repeating his World Cup heroics in Germany of three years ago by engineering another stunning Socceroos comeback against the 'Blue Samurai' at the MCG on Wednesday night.

Cahill confirmed his reputation as the Socceroos' most important player and one of the best big-game players in world football by scoring two goals as Australia came from 1-0 down to beat its greatest footballing rival 2-1 in a thrilling end to its 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign.

The Socceroos might have failed in their bid to become the first team ever to go through the final group stage of Asian qualifying without conceding a goal, but Pim Verbeek's team completed the most emphatic qualifying campaign ever by an Australian team with an inspiring come-from-behind victory.

The result meant Australia ended its long qualifying campaign five points clear of its biggest Asian rival in Group One and went through the final group stage undefeated as it handed the Japanese their first loss of the final group stage.

In front of a crowd of more nearly 70,000 fans at the MCG - nearly double last week's measly crowd of 39,000 for the match against Bahrain in Sydney - the two giants of the Asian confederation turned in another game to remember in the latest of a series of epic encounters in the past three years.

First there was the unforgettable opening game of the 2006 World Cup Finals in Germany - when Australia won 3-1 after scoring three goals in the last 10 minutes - then there was the 2007 Asian Cup quarter-final in Hanoi, which the Japanese won on a penalty shoot-out, while the two teams had also played out a 0-0 draw earlier in this stage of World Cup qualifying in Yokohama.

Neither side had lost in the final group stage coming into this match with the Socceroos already safely through to their second successive World Cup Finals - in South Africa next year - and their third overall while Japan had already qualified for its fourth successive World Cup Finals, having qualified for the first time ever in 1998.

With that in mind both Australian coach Pim Verbeek and his Japanese counterpart Takeshi Okada fielded second-string line-ups with a host of big names missing from both teams including Harry Kewell, Marco Bresciano, Luke Wilkshire, Scott Chipperfield, Chris Coyne and Craig Moore for the Socceroos while Japan only fielded one player based outside its own domestic J-League with the big-name absentees including Celtic star Shunsuke Nakamura, German-based pair Makuto Hasebe and Yoshito Okubo as well as captain Yuji Nakazawa, who was ill.

But after the home side began brightly with Cahill having a shot well saved by keeper Seigo Narazaki in the seventh minute - Japan dominated the first half.

A goal for the visitors seemed inevitable and it came on 40 minutes when towering defender Tulio Tanaka headed home unchallenged at a corner to leave the home crowd stunned.

It was the first time keeper Mark Schwarzer had been beaten in eight matches in the final stage of qualifying and the first goal Australia had conceded in 702 minutes of playing time since suffering a 1-0 loss to China in Sydney a year ago in what was a dead rubber at the end of the first group stage in this