The Socceroos’ most important 90 minutes of the past four years kicks off at noon AEST today. A win or draw against Paraguay will send Australia through to the first round of the World Cup’s knockout phase, likely to face a team they’re more than capable of conquering.

Defeat, however, will either send the Socceroos home early, or see them limp into the next round courtesy of results in the other groups. If that happened, their next opponent would probably be a heavyweight like Germany or France.

As Steve Georgakis writes, the Paraguay game will either validate coach Tony Popovic’s conservative, counterattacking gameplan, or expose it as unduly defensive.

So are you tempted to bunk off work and watch the Socceroos get the job done? Look, we can’t tell you not to, but as workplace law expert Shae McCrystal points out, honesty is always the best policy.

PS. There are just a few days left of our fundraising campaign. We’re tremendously grateful to all those who’ve given, and if you’ve been thinking about supporting us and haven’t yet, now is the time.