By Jesse Fink
February 6th 2009 @ 3:07am
The A-League’s bleeding of players must stop
It’s becoming almost ridiculous now. Refresh your page on any football news site on the net and another Australian player is heading off to north Asia. Sasho Petrovski, Mark Bridge and even that great flop John Aloisi are all rumoured to be mulling over offers to go to the Chinese Super League.
Before you know it, there’ll be no players left.
But Football Federation Australia even today (and I know, just having done a radio interview with one of its bods as a guest) is still sticking to its guns, talking of financial responsibility and persisting with this delusional idea that lifestyle considerations are going to bring in good foreign players to make up for the good local ones we’re losing hand over fist.
It can’t go on unchecked. There has to be a correction. A circuit-breaker.
I wrote about the importance of something being done a couple of weeks ago on The Roar and in that short time the urgency of the situation has only ratcheted up to critical.
While the intention of the cap remains noble it is completely out of kilter with what is required to take on these avaricious Asian clubs.
The FFA wants a “sustainable model” in place for all the clubs but what is the point of sustaining a competition that has no decent talent left? What use to anyone is a “level playing field” if all the players on it are ordinary?
The fans aren’t stupid. They want to see the best players in the country and if not given them will turn away from the game. They want to see their clubs fight tooth and nail to keep the best players, not keel over like shot horses the moment an Asian club opens its chequebook.
To that end, FFA, please allow clubs to pay wage bills as a fixed percentage of their total income from all sources of revenue.
It was suggested by a reader on my World Game blog and I think it’s a great idea. If it means the A-League has a new superclub, likely Melbourne, then so be it. It’s a way to reward success and keep good players in the country while also encouraging clubs to explore new revenue streams so they too can spend more on quality players.
There’s also the obvious (to me, anyway) contradiction of bidding for a World Cup and positioning ourselves as the most capable nation in the region to host such an event yet being demonstrably incapable of thwarting these concerted player raids by showing some backbone of our own.
What’s the plan, FFA?
The more players that go, the weaker our competition becomes, the less likely we are to win an Asian Champions League, the less likely we are to gain those extra Asian Champions League places, the less money goes into the game, the less chance we having of winning the right to host the World Cup.
Everything is interconnected.
A few years ago the people running the game in Australia said the key to the future of Australian football was a healthy and viable domestic league. The hope was to make our A-League as much a popular success as the Socceroos.
The Socceroos are gaining in popularity but the A-League, in many ways, has gone backwards. The imbalance can be arrested but it’s going to take some concerted effort and some fresh thinking.
The question is: Is the FFA really on the ball?
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Scott B said | February 6th 2009 @ 4:20am | Report comment
Agreed,
I doubt however that many would be complaining if the players where going to England, Spain, Italy, Germany or France (1st divisions) or even Holland or Belgium. Getting to my point. The A-League is not of a good enough standard for players to go directly into top European starting line-ups. The current situation only puts the league back further. Money over ambition?
If any of the players moving to North Asia become regulars in the Socceroos team this will only promote the process.
The league will remain poor. Any players that perform well will be bought/sold directly. It’s only business.
Koala Bear said | February 6th 2009 @ 7:37am | Report comment
Jesse,
I wouldn’t fret too much; it will soon settle down and with the 8 new kids that came through the ranks for SFC last season will be around for a few years yet before they go overseas.. Then a new lot will come through … I think the conveyor belt is working fine now with the NYL in place .. They are full time very good young professionals, and they are showing that they have as good a technique, skill and enthusiasm as the ones heading to China .. Admittitly not paid as well as the Northern Asian lads .. However, the kids in Australia have proven they can out perform, out play, the established old brigade that are heading overseas.. I think we need to identify our very best youngsters earlier and tie them up before they are scouted by the top Asian clubs .. So if a youngster impresses earlier he can go but at least the club can get a return and develop more promising youngsters out there on the fringe.. But let us have a look at the German model of player payments, maybe it is worth investigating for the future…
~~~~~~~~
KB
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 10:13am | Report comment
The circuit breaker will arrive – by stealth.
CCM led the way last season.
We now have Adelaide signing Rostyn Griffiths for the finals to replace Spagnuolo, who has a scratch and has only started in three games anyway (what happend to the idea of the Youth League?).
Next season, we’ll have GCU nursing 3 or 4 no hopers with migraines, and they will be forced to bring in players from the EPL and Serie A as “injury replacements” to play just for the finals (maybe a couple of games beforehand).
The circuit breaker in full bloom.
StiflersMom said | February 6th 2009 @ 10:43am | Report comment
The last thing I want is a Scottish Premier league where the two richest clubs battle for the title each year and the rest are battling for a distant third. The abolition of the salary cap will also mean the abolition of some clubs. If every club was owned by a Clive Palmer it would be OK but some are trying to archive a profit, although Con seems to make his profit by selling players.
Rather than a knee jerk reaction Jesse, maybe a variation on the 3+1 rule? in our case 5+1 so we can have 1 Asian player who does not count as a visa player but also is outside the Salary cap, that way we can buy a player as good or better than we lose. What do you think?
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 11:00am | Report comment
A little flexibility in the salary cap is needed.
Every international cap (iirespective of nationality) gets a certain exemption from salary cap.
HAving said that – only about 3 clubs are using the entire salary cap – melbourne, adelaide and one other team, perhaps sydney. The rest team salary is below the cap. So I;m not too sure raising the cap would stop the raid as the other clubs don’t have the finance to go above the salary cap anyway.
Joel griffith is poach despite his entire salary is outside the cap. I think this issue can’t really be solve except just accepting we are the 6th best league in Asia.
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 11:01am | Report comment
Stiflersmom
FIFA 6+5 rule prevents having 6 foreigners. At best we can have 4+1
Kazama said | February 6th 2009 @ 12:08pm | Report comment
The removal of the salary cap would bring create a top-heavy league where two or three all-powerful clubs battle for the silverware every season but the rest of the teams are left in the dust. Maybe with all of the tradition in Europe fans are happy to support teams that will never win anything, but here in Australia fans demand success and that is why the cap is in place, to give all teams a chance of winning the toilet seat.
I’ve raised the Joel Griffiths point before as dasilva did above – how can we say that it is solely the salary cap holding back the A-League when a marquee player, exempt from the limitations of the cap, heads to China?
Another point I raised on this topic was that the K-League has no cap, their teams dwarf ours in terms of player payments, yet they can’t stop their best players from going to Japan or Europe.
There are two options – 1) continue with the current plan and accept our place in the international pecking order or 2) scrap the salary cap, allow the A-League to become dominated by the ‘haves’ and see what happens.
Option #2 might keep all of our best talent here but it might also cause the league to collapse in a very short space of time if they are all at one or two clubs. Jesse makes the point of the fans wanting the best – well I think most fans would still be unsatisfied because only two or three clubs would have the best players. The risk in this scenario is the remaining clubs going down in flames like the NZ Knights. IMO the A-League is Australia’s last chance to have a professional football league. It dies and there will be no resurrection like there was when the NSL went down. So to remove the cap is a big call. Every possible outcome needs to be carefully considered and analysed in terms of probability before proceeding.
If I am wrong for supporting the cap, that’s fine because what I write won’t ultimately change anything. In this case I am quite happy to merely be some idiot with an opinion and a forum to voice it in rather than the guy calling the shots. I wouldn’t want this pressure on my shoulders.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 12:46pm | Report comment
People
Why are we concerned about one or two clubs dominating proceedings?
To have 80% of the comp battling it out for 3rd place is nothing to fear. To aim for 3rd place is not an admission of failure, it’s a noble quest under the circumstances. Accept your lot in life.
Leave the important silverware to those who are most deserving!
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 12:48pm | Report comment
Kaz
who needs a cap when AU has worked out a brilliant loophole!
Make sure a nothing player has a bit of a scratch and then bring in a ring-in from overseas just to play in the finals!
Victer said | February 6th 2009 @ 1:10pm | Report comment
Salary cap will remain for the next ten years that’s for sure. The problem is we seem to be developing a trade surplus with players to the overseas market, and there is only so much talent in the state league’s to choose from. It’s time for the FFA to realise that it needs to have a 5+2 rule for foreigners. That way teams who have qualified for the ACL will have more of a chance to choose three quality foreigners and one quality Asian player to take with them to the ACL. Not to mention more expansion will drain the local pond even more. We need more access to overseas players to cope with turnover efficiently.
Greg Russell said | February 6th 2009 @ 1:53pm | Report comment
Jesse,
I’m sure I don’t need to tell you or anyone here that the purpose of the salary cap is to ensure fiscal responsibility. The history of Australian football shows that clubs will kill themselves without such a restraint. Of course this happens overseas all the time (Leeds United, anyone?), but the difference in markets like that is that there are many other clubs ready to step in. With Australia’s lack of gradations (i.e., the next layer under the A-League is a long, long way below), our shop-window collapses if clubs go belly up.
So you address this by suggesting “FFA, please allow clubs to pay wage bills as a fixed percentage of their total income from all sources of revenue.”
Indeed, this does at least assure fiscal responsibility. However what it fails to address is the need for competitiveness across the board. Put simply, we have too many sporting choices here and we are too immature a footballing culture for perpetual losers to survive in terms of support. The fact is that as soon as a club stops winning in Australia, its support dwindles down to a core that is too small to enable long-term survival. I know it is hard for football tragics to understand this, but the fact of the matter is that football tragics are too small a proportion of our landscape (although they do make a disproportionate amount of noise!). Again, we are crucially different to the leagues of Europe in this respect. Our cousins in England seem happy to keep supporting all the also-rans in the Premiership even though there is no end in sight to its domination by just 4 teams. However the same would not happen in the A-League were it to be dominated year after year by superclubs in Melbourne and (say) Sydney.
Frank Lowy understands you but he also understands the above all too well. Until we have in place a large and unshakeable football culture, II don’t really see any alternative to Lowy’s vision of growing the pie (equally shared), as opposed to allowing unequal divisions of a pie that would probably stop growing.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 1:58pm | Report comment
Sydney a super club???
C’mon – let’s get this discussion back on track!
Kazama said | February 6th 2009 @ 1:59pm | Report comment
Pippinu
Rostyn Griffiths is not the first player we have signed before a finals series (Greg Owens and Jason Spagnuolo in 2005/6) nor are we the only team to have done so (Sydney FC signed Jonas Salley on loan from the Knights in 2006/7).
None of those players made much of an impact, and neither side won the toilet seat. I expect that Griffiths will have little influence on the finals series and I believe you admitted as much elsewhere on this site.
Like it or not, we are operating within the rules and your club is entitled to do the same thing. Personally I don’t think clubs should be allowed to sign players specifically for the finals, even as injury replacements, but as long as the rule is there it is something we will have to live with. You are entitled to your complaint, but if Griffiths scores a hat trick tomorrow night I won’t be losing any sleep over it – same as if Muscat breaks Dodd’s leg in the 3rd minute and escapes even a booking you won’t lose any sleep over it.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 2:11pm | Report comment
Kaz
if you can live with yourself, and follow a club that relies on ring ins, that’s fine.
At Melbounre, we rely on the actual team to do the job for us.
Kazama said | February 6th 2009 @ 2:18pm | Report comment
No worries. Maybe we will have Drogba and Torres lining up for the second leg.
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 2:49pm | Report comment
There’s nothing wrong with drafting players for the finals.
Central coast done it with Aloisi. NEwcastle jets with Song which ended up winning the premiership.
If a players get injured – then we should be able to get new players. To me there’s no problem with that.
Pip
If you can live with a club captain by a thug then that’s fine as well
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 2:55pm | Report comment
Das
I’m all for freeing it all up – let’s get rid of the silly rules, and let clubs do whatever they want.
I actually thought the youth league was all about providing cover for injuries.
Otherwise, for a cashed up GCU, injuires become a godsend because the replacement doesn’t come under the cap – or are you conveniently forgetting that aspect?
I look forward to wacthing GCU bring in 5 or 6 ring ins because a few of their no hopers have migraines.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:14pm | Report comment
Does anyone else think we’ve lost a bit of momentum this year in the build up to the finals (with the week off)?
Interesting article here in 442:
http://au.fourfourtwo.com/news/95764,blog-excitement-reaching-a-peak–sort-of.aspx
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:31pm | Report comment
THere could be a restriction where the replacement players should have the same salary as the players they are replacing. That will fix up any loop holes
However the question is – Do we want to fix it?
Dave said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:33pm | Report comment
Interesting point Pip but l guess not a great deal that could be done about it.
Can any of the Adelaide bloggers tell us how ticket sales are going for the semi v MV
Maybe Midfielder can advise uson the expected crowd v QR.
2 capacity or near capacity crowds and it wouldn’t seem much harm done by the break.
BTW Good to hear SEN broadcast in full KM’s airport interview before leaving for Adelaide.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:33pm | Report comment
Das
some teams obviously don’t want to fix it!
In which case – scrap the all the restrictions, rather than have teams work out ways around them.
No half arsed amateur comp in the land of any description would allow a team to bring someone in just for the finals.
If you guys can’t see that that’s a problem – we are clearly on a different planet.
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:40pm | Report comment
Pip
I think most competition restrict transfer between clubs and have a dedicated transfer window. However they can’t stop free transfer of free agents and I believe we didn’t pay Blackburn a transfer fee for Griffiths.
But yeah – if the replacement players rule wants to be credible then they should cap the maximum wage to equal the wage of the injured players. If not then there’s no point of having a salary cap.
Michael C said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:47pm | Report comment
Pip -
No half arsed amateur comp in the land of any description would allow a team to bring someone in just for the finals.
so how do you describe the KFC big bash domestic 20/20 tourney???
quarter rrrr’s’d??
Kazama said | February 6th 2009 @ 3:52pm | Report comment
Dave: “Can any of the Adelaide bloggers tell us how ticket sales are going for the semi v MV”
Not good from what I’ve heard.
dasilva: “I believe we didn’t pay Blackburn a transfer fee for Griffiths”
It’s club policy not to pay transfer fees. It’s (one reason) why we didn’t get Mori for the first A-League season.
Phutbol said | February 6th 2009 @ 4:07pm | Report comment
The ’super club’ argument could be mitigated to some extent by capping the richer clubs at a % above the poorest club. Example: cap is 60% of total revenue but also capped at a maximum of (say) 30% above what the lowest club makes. So Melb = 10mil turnover = $6million cap but if say Jets (lowest revenue) = 5 Mil turnover = 3Mil cap, then Melb’s max spend becomes 3Mil + 30%= $3.9 Mil.
the limits could be adjusted but thats just one option. still better than a fixed cap. Someone already said that some clubs dont spend the max cap now so there is already inequality in player payments.
There is also the argument that just because you have the most expensive player roster, doesnt mean you automatically win. I’m sure better coaching, conditioning, and tactics must come into it somewhere. Within reason of course, which is what a formula like the above provides.
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 4:20pm | Report comment
Kazama
Obviously I need some brushing up on club policy – why is that the case?
Would that change when the money from ACL and CWC comes in?
Kazama said | February 6th 2009 @ 4:32pm | Report comment
I guess to keep the operating costs down. Most of the money we get from the ACL and CWC will probably be used to cover the costs of playing in the ACL and running the youth team. Running a professional football team isn’t cheap and if you can avoid paying transfer fees then I’m sure it goes some way to keeping the club stable.
Question – have any A-League clubs paid a transfer fee yet?
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 4:50pm | Report comment
I think there have been some transfer fee to get players from state leagues – I think FFA has a 3k cap meaning if the A-league offers a transfer fee of 3k the state league clubs, then they must accept the bid.
There is no transfer fees for clubs overseas.
However, Melbourne may become the first with Carlos Hernandez.
Pippinu said | February 6th 2009 @ 5:06pm | Report comment
Phutbol
I think Millster or Midfield have pointed to the Bundesliga in the past where they have a quasi-cap linked to your revenues. So if the team with the most revenues has double the income of the team with the least, that would essentially equate to the top team having double the cap available to it than the lowest, with everything in between.
The sounds like quite a fair system that also works to keep clubs financially responsible, while offering incentives for clubs to get bigger and better (which doesn’t exist at the moment).
Mind you, where there is a 2:1 ratio, I’d expect that team to have a much better roster. On the other hand, a team spending only 10 to 20% more than a team, is not necessarily going to beat them every time they meet on the park – I reckon that much is certainly true (whereas a gap of 20% in a game like AFL is massive, and you’d put your house on that team winning every time).
Ben of Phnom Penh said | February 6th 2009 @ 5:33pm | Report comment
I’m with KB on this one. The biggest talent drain has always been at the point where 15 year olds have to choose between sports and have gone with other codes/tennis/cricket due to the fact that they provided surer grounds to succeed as a professional athlete. A number of young kids have stepped up from the Youth League this year and a number more are on their way. There will be a period where demand and supply won’t meet due to the supply lag however over the medium to long term this is exceptionally good news for Australian football as the increase in professional options increases the attractiveness of the sport for our young athletes. I believe the quality of the local game will improve due to these developments, not decline, as more talented kids choose football for their professional careers.
dasilva said | February 6th 2009 @ 6:38pm | Report comment
Here’s Pim Verbeek prospective about australian players leaving to join Asia. He see’s it as not a problem at all. I think this is one of the few things that KB and Pim can agree with.
Goal: Your own country, the Netherlands, is so small but so often produces brilliant players and coaches. Asia, with over a billion people, still looks to foreign influences in its football, particularly in coaching. Is there a solution?
PV: With all due respect to the Asian coaches and culture, we shouldn’t forget that in the Netherlands we started playing football in around 1890. For us, football is in our blood. I saw my first professional football game when I was three because my father played in the Dutch professional league. But that’s not just the case for me but for everybody in the Netherlands. Where we live, we see Belgian football, English football, German football, Italian football all at the right moments, in the evening or by day, so football in Europe is so much a part of our life and here it is just starting. It will take a little bit more time.
Here in Australia, for me it is very similar to the Dutch league; we don’t have the money, we will always lose our best players and we will always have to produce new players, young players and make them better players. We don’t have the money to say “he’s not good, let’s buy another one”. We need to look at how we can make them better. That’s how we think in the Netherlands and that fits very well in Australia as well.
Goal: So you don’t see the exodus of Australian players overseas – particularly to Asia – as a problem?
PV: No, because if you see it as a problem then you have a problem, otherwise it’s not realistic. In the Netherlands we have some big clubs with the money to pay but in the end, every player wants to play in England, Spain or Italy, not necessarily for the money but for the leagues. That is what is going to happen here.
The question of whether we should be happy with our players going to the other Asian leagues, I can understand it, because of the new experience it presents. The money is better but whether they will be a better player, that’s what we’ll have to find out in the coming years. I know how difficult it is to play in the K-League because it’s a tough league and the J-League and even the Chinese league is coming strong again.
Goal: Do you think Australian players are better off playing in other Asian leagues?
PV: As long as the league only lasts for seven months here then the other Asian leagues have an advantage. The J-league starts in March and finishes at the end of December, it is a league with tough games, a lot of games, a lot of travelling, it is a different story than over here and the Korean league is exactly the same. It is a tough league because of the intensity and the media attention.
Here it is still “nice”; on page 9 there is something about football but in Korea there is something about football from page 1-10, every day. OK, you probably can’t read it and that’s the good part but there’s always pressure, you can feel it on the shoulders of the clubs, the coaches and the players. So mentally, it can be good to another country but football-wise, Adelaide showed that the A-League is not that bad at all. Yes, we will lose our best players from here but there’s nothing I can do about it.
Koala Bear said | February 7th 2009 @ 10:49am | Report comment
Ben of Phnom Penh, and Das,
Agreed…! and to say finally Pimbo and I have a point of view that we both can agree on… My dream .. as a still living old Senior Australian Citizen .. To be still alive to witness an Australian Born National Manager with a home grown National Football team to win the 2018 WC on Australian Soil… That’s my dream … Starting from the beginning of watching the Socceroos playing in the 1974 World Cup in West Germany ..
~~~~~~~
KB
The 1 and Only Master said | February 7th 2009 @ 11:20am | Report comment
unBEARable,
What a waste of a life
Koala Bear said | February 7th 2009 @ 12:04pm | Report comment
Laddie,
are you still standing on that ledge .??.. Jump God damn it…
I have a dream…
~~~~~~~~~~
FIFA The real 1 and Only Master ..
The 1 and Only Master said | February 7th 2009 @ 1:02pm | Report comment
unBEARable
Less than 10K at an A-League final last night.
How very very very dismal. Maybe Frank Lowry is standing on that ledge
Koala Bear said | February 7th 2009 @ 1:59pm | Report comment
Less than 10K at an A-League final last night.
It’s me unBEARable…
We are happy with it, as Bluetounge stadium was surrounded by bush fires….
laddie,
He’s too busy with the 2018 world cup preparations and accepting trophies from the Yanks in America .. However, when you do decide to jump, can you have a relative of yours put it on Youtube.. I would love to see it… 
Lowy Jump … ???
~~~~~~~
FIFA the real 1 and Only Master ..
Matt said | June 21st 2009 @ 11:28am | Report comment
HAL is rubbish. It will never be a great league or even a good league. Stick to the foreign leagues lads.
Footbal Person said | January 20th 2010 @ 9:56am (3 weeks ago) | Report comment
And you support manU ? noLiverpool, NO WAIT BARCELONA. a-league is on par with most leagues ,the global standard is not the prem league standard.