The penalty call didn’t just feel unfair on Odiljon Hamrobekov, the Uzbekistan midfielder whose trailing arm was accidentally clipped by the ball as he slid in to intercept a shot from Kusini Yengi.

It also felt, to many others watching, unfair for the Socceroos: a team that, until that shimmying run by Yengi just before half-time, hadn’t really done enough in the preceding 42 minutes — or, indeed, in the past two games — to deserve such a cosmic leg-up that penalties can provide in football.

For the third game in a row at this year’s Asian Cup, Australia were handed an accidental lifeline: an avoidable error, a chaotic deflection, or a harsh refereeing call thrown like an inflatable ring into the water that they had been, for the most part, treading to nowhere.

Against India, after a slow and groaning first half, a careless flap by goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh Sandhu pushed the ball right into the chest of Socceroos midfielder Jackson Irvine. He was standing instinctively near the penalty spot, but probably wasn’t expecting the keeper to practically gift him the opening goal in the 50th minute.

Against Syria, following yet another rigid opening half, a hopeful cross from Martin Boyle ping-ponged off three players before spinning towards Irvine in the box. He reacted immediately, pirouetting before poking a hopeful toe towards it, stretching just enough to squeeze the ball beneath the keeper’s legs for Australia’s only goal (and their only shot on target) in the whole game.

And against Uzbekistan on Tuesday night, the same invisible hand hovered above Al Janoub Stadium, tossing down yet another life-raft — a controversial penalty call — for the Socceroos to cling to. The Uzbek bench erupted in fury after a lengthy VAR check as their head coach, Srečko Katanec, clapped the fourth official with violent sarcasm. Like the previous game, Boyle’s converted penalty was the team’s only shot on target across the entire 97 minutes.

Luck has been on the Socceroos’ side down the other end of the field throughout this group stage, too.

The post and the offside flag have come to their rescue more than once, as have the miraculously long legs of Harry Souttar, who has had to make up for his team-mates’ (as well as his own) unforced errors on several occasions. Turn-overs, intercepted passes, easy overloads: all three of Australia’s opponents have found ways through them. However, like the Socceroos, all three have lacked clinical finishers, so the damage has been minimal.

What to make of all this, then? What conclusions can we draw?

There is a more cynical reading, which is that the Socceroos have relied far too heavily on these lucky moments to qualify them for the round of 16.

These goal-scoring moments were, essentially, not of their own making; they arrived thanks to variables beyond their own control. They capitalised on them, sure, but the chorus of online opinion appears to be that this team should be of such high-quality that they shouldn’t have to rely on lucky calls to win games in the first place.

The second is a more generous (though more boring) interpretation: that the Socceroos have created the circumstances to manifest these moments of luck for themselves.

Irvine doesn’t score against India without practising the same sequence of moves — the cross, the ghosting runs into the box, the dummies that fluster the goalkeeper — again and again.

He doesn’t score against Syria without Martin Boyle forcing himself (and the ball) through a forest of players or without his own movement from midfield to catch the scattered defenders off-guard.

And Boyle doesn’t bury the penalty against Uzbekistan if Kusini Yengi doesn’t slalom into the box and cut the ball back for a team-mate, only for Hamrobekov’s trailing arm to prevent it from reaching its destination.

But at the end of the day, does it really matter how the Socceroos progress through a major tournament, so long as they do? That is the question that head coach Graham Arnold and his new-look team are now asking us to explore.

Australia have just topped Group B, after all. They’ve secured seven out of a possible nine points, while conceding just one goal along the way. Only two other teams — Qatar and (at the time of writing) Thailand — have yet to concede a goal across the entire tournament thus far, while other favoured nations like Japan, South Korea, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates have slipped against those they were expected to stomp over.

Great teams (on paper, at least) aren’t guaranteed anything here. Sometimes luck is the deciding factor.

There are other factors worth keeping in mind, too. There’s the short window that Arnold has to work with his players ahead of competitions like this, too. This isn’t a daily club environment, where you have the luxury of time and facilities and resources to tweak and twist small details.

This is a team of scattered individuals (some of whom have never met) thrust together for two weeks before being thrown into a major tournament with high stakes: there is only so much you can do, so much chemistry you can develop, so many patterns and dimensions you can add, within those circumstances.

It has been interesting watching the public reaction to the Socceroos’ performances so far in this Asian Cup, especially compared to the men’s World Cup run just over a year ago. They are now at the same stage as they were then — the round of 16 — yet the sentiments and discourse around them are vastly juxtaposed.

Perhaps it is due to their differing contexts. Against France, Tunisia and Denmark at the World Cup, the Socceroos were underdogs: a role that they embraced and echoed in their football on the field.

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Their strong mentality and togetherness was visible in their ability to absorb pressure and counter-attack at speed, throwing themselves into every challenge, defending as a unit, never giving up, and taking their rare opportunities when they came.

But against India, Syria and Uzbekistan, those roles have reversed: they are the favourites here, the big dogs, the team who are forced to dominate and create more opportunities with the ball, to break down deep defensive blocks and prevent the counter-attacks.

It is not a position they’re familiar with. Little wonder, then, that their football throughout this group stage has looked so unfamiliar.

“You know how hard it is to get 26 players together?” Arnold said after the Uzbekistan draw.

“They play all around the world, different competitions, they’re coached completely different ways.

“We have a great team culture of mateship. When the energy is high, and the boys are good mates, then you can over-achieve. And that’s what we’re doing.

“Over-achieve” might have been a slip of the tongue by Arnold, but it poses a deeper question that Australian football hasn’t fully grappled with yet: should the Socceroos be better than this? If so, why? According to what ideas, assumptions, or arguments? Who or what are we comparing them to, and are those comparisons fair?

Are our expectations of this team out of step with their reality, particularly in the ever-shifting context of Asian and world football? What exactly do we want from them, and are they actually capable of that?

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The Socceroos will face Palestine in the round of 16 on Sunday night.

They last faced each other in a World Cup qualifier back in November, which ended 1-0 to Australia thanks to an early Harry Souttar header from a corner.

All signs point to another tight and tense affair in this first knock-out stage, particularly as one of these nations are currently fuelled by something far deeper than football.

Australia, who have yet to fully dominate a game so far in this tournament, could very well spark to life now that they’ve cleared the safety net of a group stage and are teetering on the precipice of elimination.

They could find their clinical edge, their creativity, their improvisation, their chemistry: all the things that so many of us have wanted to see from them until now.

They also might not.

Instead, they may just have to keep their heads above water, readying themselves for an unexpected flap, a wild ricochet, or a generous whistle to throw them a lifeline.

But if they emerge from it at the end of the 90 minutes, will it really matter whether the luck was of their own making? Or simply that it was there for them at all?