Socceroo Awer Mabil says his penalty which helped Australia to a spot in the World Cup finals in Qatar was a thank you to the country for taking in him and his family.
Mabil, born to South Sudanese parents in a Kenyan refugee camp, found the net from 12 yards to bring Australia level with Peru in the shoot-out, with goalkeeper Andrew Redmayne making a save in sudden death for the win on Tuesday morning.
The Socceroos will face France, Denmark and Tunisia in the group stage of the tournament, which starts in November.
"My hotel room here is bigger than the room we had as a family back in the refugee camp. For Australia to take us in and resettle us, it gave me and my family a chance of life," 26-year-old Mabil told reporters from Qatar.
"I knew I was going to score. It was the only way to say thank you to Australia, from me and my family."
"So that's on behalf of my family just to say thank you to the whole of Australia."
Mabil said he had arrived in Australia as a child just in time to see the 'Golden Generation' of Socceroos, which included Tim Cahill and Harry Kewell, play at the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
Redmayne has been hailed the "hero" of the match after coming into the game moments before full time in place of captain Maty Ryan and saving Peru's sixth penalty to secure Australia's win.
It's the fifth time in a row Australia will be at the World Cup finals.
After 120 goalless minutes, Aaron Mooy, Craig Goodwin, Ajdin Hrustic, Jamie Maclaren and Awer Mabil all scored from the spot to make up for Martin Boyle's miss before Redmayne denied Peru's Alex Valera to spark joyous celebrations at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium in Doha, Qatar.
The victory is also a triumph for Socceroos coach Graham Arnold, who will now lead the country to a World Cup finals after fighting to save his job when he missed out on automatic qualification in March.
His decision to bring on Redmayne in place of Ryan just before fulltime will go down as a master-stroke with the Sydney FC goalkeeper joining Mark Schwarzer and John Aloisi as a World Cup penalty shootout hero.
The Wiggles sent their praise online, giving Redmayne the honorary title of "Grey Wiggle" for his distracting jig along the goal line that resembled the group's famous Hot Potato dance moves.
"Congratulations to all the Socceroos, especially Andrew the Grey Wiggle, mate you've inspired everybody including Jeff — he wants to be a goalkeeper just like you," Anthony Field, the Blue Wiggle said.
Matildas captain Sam Kerr showed her support by telling doubters to "eat your hats" in a tweet shortly after the win.
She continued: "We're going to the world cup. Socceroos well done!!!"
Recently appointed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was also quick to share his support, tweeting "World Cup here we come."
Among celebrations, condolences were also offered up to Peru for being a "great opponent".
Former Socceroos player Craig Moore wrote in a tweet, "I'd also like to offer my thoughts to Peru."
"Losing that way is never nice and I know you will be back. Great opponent so good luck moving forward," he wrote.
How the match played out
Everything was against Australia heading into the contest, a one-off intercontinental playoff between Peru as the fifth placed-team in South America and the Socceroos — winners of the Asian confederation fourth-round playoff (against UAE the previous week).
Peru, the world No.22, were highly fancied to beat the Socceroos as they did at the 2018 World Cup, especially with approximately 12,000 fans cheering them on in the stands compared to roughly 500 Australian supporters.
Having battled through 120 minutes, the shootout began horribly for the Socceroos with Peru captain Pedro Gallese saving Martin Boyle's opener.
From there though the Socceroos didn't miss with Mooy, Goodwin, Hrustic, Jamie and Mabil all scoring from the spot before Redmayne's moment to shine.
Redmayne dived to his right and saved Peru substitute Alex Valera's penalty to spark celebrations for the Australians in front of their small supporter block.
Earlier, after a spirited opening, the first shot on target for either team came via Hrustic in the 81st minute but his long-range free kick was easily claimed by Gallese.
Four minutes later, left-back Aziz Behich picked up a loose ball and beat two Peruvians before shooting just wide from outside the box.
Hrustic nearly stole the win for Australia in the 88th minute when he was found by substitute Mabil's cutback but Gallese just managed to keep the midfielder's shot from squirming in.
Flores had Peru's first shot on target in the first period of extra-time before his header hit the post.
Arnold then turned to Redmayne moments before the final whistle, in a decision which will now go down in Australian sporting folklore.
"Guus Hiddink, I was his assistant in 2005," Arnold said of Australia's famous shootout win over Uruguay in Sydney.
"He was going to do the same thing with Mark Schwarzer and take off Schwarzer and put on Zeljko Kalac.
"It was a risk, but it worked out."
