The Socceroos will require a new captain for their second game of the Asian Cup, after Mile Jedinak was ruled out of Tuesday night’s game against Oman.

Jedinak hurt his left ankle close to halftime in Australia’s 4-1 win over Kuwait in Australia’s opening group game in Melbourne last Friday.

Jedinak soldiered on to the end of the game after receiving treatment, scoring a second half penalty along the way, but he hasn’t been able to recover quickly enough to take on Oman.

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Coach Ange Postecoglou is happy to take a wait-and-see approach with the Crystal Palace skipper when it comes to Saturday’s final group match against South Korea in Brisbane.

“He’s not quite right to play and at this stage of the tournament we are better to give it a few days extra rest and we will re-assess where he’s at for the game against Korea Republic,” Postecoglou said.

Socceroos skipper Mile Jedinak. Photo: Getty

“While it is not ideal for Mile to miss the game, I’m confident we have the players and depth to be able to cover for not having him out there.

“We worked hard on increasing our depth over the last six months leading into the Asian Cup and that has us in a good position to be able to cover for the loss of a player of Mile’s calibre.”

Central defender Trent Sainsbury echoed the sentiments of his coach while conceding Jedinak would be a big loss.

“We’ve got enough depth in the squad to still keep moving forward,” Sainsbury said.

“Mile will be a big miss, but at the same time his leadership skills don’t just end on the pitch.”

Sainsbury was also full of admiration for the inspirational way in which Jedinak kept going after he suffered the injury.

“It just shows how tough he is, playing on for the rest of the game with an ankle that looked like it had buckled sideways,” Sainsbury said.

The captaincy for the Oman game remains undecided but both Tim Cahill and Mark Bresciano have the experience and were joint vice-captains behind Jedinak at last year’s World Cup.

In terms of the make-up of the team Mark Milligan looks the logical replacement for Jedinak’s on-field position, given he plays a similar role for A-League club Melbourne Victory.

While Jedinak’s injury will force one change for the game against Oman, who lost 1-0 to South Korea in Canberra on Saturday, Postecoglou may well consider others, with Australia’s three group games squeezed into a nine-day period.

“The whole team will get used at some point,” said striker Nathan Burns,who almost scored twice after coming off the bench against Kuwait.

“It’s important that all the players that didn’t play in the last game should be ready, because we need the whole squad to win this tournament.”

“Everyone knows that and we’ve all got our part to play.”

-AAP