The Socceroos have been frantically wheeled into tournament favouritism by bookmakers after the United Arab Emirates' penalty shootout victory over Samurai Blue at ANZ Stadium on Friday night.

The defending champions were regarded by all as the team most likely to conquer Australia but the Socceroos now find themselves in an unlikely position at a major international tournament, a far cry from their usual underdog status.

Kruse believes they'll take the favourites tag as motivation to go all the way and lift the biggest trophy the nation is ever likely to see.

"We could be first team to win major silverware for Australia. To do it on home soil would be something special," Kruse said after the team's morning session in Newcastle on Saturday.

"It's been the focus from the beginning. It's always been the focus to come here and get the job done. The job is to win the tournament. In saying that, we take it each game as it comes and that begins with UAE on Tuesday."

However, that match at Hunter Stadium, which is nearly sold out, won't be a gimme for the Socceroos. While the public might be thrilled at seeing Japan knocked out, the Socceroos are fully aware that Mahdi Ali's side will be well-organised and difficult to break down.

"We're under no illusion that the game on Tuesday is going to be extremely difficult. Some people may say we're already in the final, but we're not looking at it that way," Kruse said.

"We saw the game last night, maybe it was an upset but it's still going to be a difficult game. We'll just focus on our game plan, we'll stick to that and hopefully we'll be all right. If we stick to our game plan, the result will be in our favour."

Newcastle is the fourth different city the Socceroos have visited in two weeks, but their back-to-back matches in Brisbane gave them a nice breather in the middle of a tournament.

They arrived in NSW's "second city" on Friday night and immediately took a light training session on Friday night before taking a different approach on Saturday morning.

Rather than sweating it out on the training field, coach Ange Postecoglou took the opportunity to let his players indulge in a classic Newcastle experience – a swim and a recovery session at Nobby's Beach.

The United Arab Emirates are easily among the most improved nations in Asian football and have impressed throughout this tournament at both ends of the park.

And while Al-Abyad have plenty of excellent players filling out their starting side, they also boast the new pin-up boy of the whole continent: Omar Abdulrahman.

"UAE are not going to be easy, we'll show them the due respect they deserve. They've got some quality players, in particular their No.10 [Abdulrahman]," Kruse said. "They've just knocked off the reigning champions and they've put in some great performances in this tournament.

"The way we've been playing, we press teams and work them around so much that in the final 30 minutes they're off their feet. Hopefully we can do that again on Tuesday and it doesn't go to extra time."

Interestingly, Australia is the only team in the semi-final who managed to win their game inside the regulation 90 minutes, with all other matches going to extra time or a penalty shootout.

While the public ticket allocation at Hunter Stadium is presently exhausted, local organising officials are hoping to convince the Asian Football Confederation to open the hill areas behind each goal – which is against AFC regulations because the areas are not seated – in order to raise capacity.