That’s the frank assessment of defender Mark Milligan as he looked back on the 1-1 draw with Denmark as a missed opportunity for Australia's nearly men.
"I think we need to start with more belief in ourselves," he said in reference to falling behind to Christian Eriksen’s seventh-minute goal at Samara’s Cosmos Arena.
"I think we’re buying a little bit too much into outside influences. I think the belief in the team isn’t a strong enough driver for us.
"There are always a lot of people writing different things about how the team should go and what should happen.
"Everybody has an opinion and we just need to focus on our beliefs."
Expanding on the theme, Milligan said Australia perhaps gave Denmark 'too much respect'.
"We could have started with a bit more belief and positivity," he said.
"We have enough about us now that we can go into match like this thinking we can win the game. We don’t have to prove it to ourselves.
"I think we showed to ourselves today that large parts of the game we dominated.
"We gave them that early chance and the class of Eriksen takes it.
"I think we should be winning this game. In the second half I spent most my time in their half and a that’s a pretty good indication of who was controlling the match."
Victory over Peru, assuming other permutations go in Australia’s favour, would see them into the knock-out stage in Russia.
And veteran defender Milligan, 32, has no doubt that target can be attained.
"I think we showed enough today that we can go into the next match and gets a result," he added.
"Obviously what happens outside of that is out of our control.
"Our supporters have been amazing and we just want to go to Sochi now and get a result to take us to the next round."
