By Jesse Fink
May 14th 2009 @ 1:41am
Related coverage
Jets boycott is a big mistake
In this photo released by the Xinhua news agency, Petrovski Sasho of Australia's Newcastle Jets leaps over a player of China's Beijing Guo'an during the AFC Champions League group E round soccer match in Beijing on Tuesday on March 10, 2009. Beijing Guo'an won 2-0. AP Photo/Xinhua, Zhang Duo
The Bad News Bears are really pushing it now. While it’s very easy to be sympathetic to the dressing-room complaints of the Newcastle Jets, and this scribe is as someone who got royally f***ed over by a number of employers of my own over the years, the wisdom of threatening a boycott of a crucial game right on the cusp of getting through to the quarter-finals of the ACL really does have to be questioned.
What on earth they thinking?
Jets owner Con Constantine is right to say the issue of ACL player bonuses, which has brought this standoff to a head, has nothing to do with him or the Jets.
“It’s between the PFA and FFA… one says it’s apples, the other says it’s bananas,” he said. “The team will be on the plane on Saturday.
And anyone who doesn’t want to play for Newcastle Jets and thinks he’s bigger than the club, then we have no problems. He stays in Newcastle and we put a younger player in to replace him.”
Which is a bit of a worry, as the Jets have just about enough “younger players” as it is. Any more and they’ll be less of a football team and more a boy band.
But Constantine is still part of the issue and it would be disingenuous of him to deny it. If the Jets players had been happy campers all along and there wasn’t so much simmering resentment among them, as there has conspicuously been (as anyone who read Ljubo Milicevic’s interview with Sebastian Hassett last week), such trifles wouldn’t have become flashpoints.
Jets director of football Remo Nogarotto has admitted “when it comes to dramas at our joint, there is always a fair bit of contributory negligence”.
And that is refreshing to hear.
That’s where the solution to the Jets’ problems needs to start and end. The players obviously feel aggrieved by a number of issues – there has scarcely been a good-news story out of the club for 12 months – and it doesn’t help their salaries are paid by a guy who has an unusual proprietorial affection for every dollar that leaves his wallet.
Much has been made of Constantine’s singlehanded propping up of the club. It is something for which he rightfully deserves much credit.
But being a stinge by the same token has diminished, I believe, a lot of the potential the club has had. People love a larger-than-life benefector but no one likes a Scrooge McDuck – and that is exactly how Constantine is seen by the media, Jets fans and his own players.
He needs to literally and metaphorically loosen up a bit.
As for the players, they would be well served by bearing in mind they are not just playing for themselves but their city, the A-League and for Australia. They have a moral duty to put their best foot forward and be focused on qualifying.
The ACL has already been tarnished in the past week by the antics of one club and it does need not another team, in particular one of our own, to bring it down once more. Especially so when the FFA is working so hard to increase Australia’s berth quota in Asia’s premier football competition.
A boycott is a disastrous outcome for everybody. No one stands to win.
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and I’m on the Roosters bandwagon a 12 point win to the chooks.
Midfielder said | May 14th 2009 @ 9:01am | Report comment
The PFA need to be careful ..what no one has said yet is the impact this may be having on future investors .. hardly make you want to pour heaps of dollars into.
whiskeymac said | May 14th 2009 @ 9:04am | Report comment
good point midfielder, especially with Adeliade up for sale.
Tifosi said | May 14th 2009 @ 9:20am | Report comment
I agree, no one wins if this continues to go on.
Which makes me wonder if playing in the Asian Champions League is actually a help or a hinderance for A-league clubs.
Games are played to low crowds here in oz and overseas in some cases, and with the travel costs incurred by flying overseas, the clubs cant be making money off this.
Add to the fact that the owners of a-league clubs here arent exactly on the world’s rich list, then you can see why a-league clubs are struggling financially.
Adelaide United being a case in point. CL success didn’t help them much at all.
But it will be meaningless anyway, the Jets wont progress through to the next phase, even if they only need a draw.
DS said | May 14th 2009 @ 10:32am | Report comment
The ACL is more a competition for the future than for the present. The AFC plans for the comp are ambitious and we need to be there now, not only for the commercial future, but to be good football citizens of the confederation.
burgerman said | May 14th 2009 @ 11:18am | Report comment
tifossi,
adelaide’s problems aren’t to do with the club. It is the business dealings of its owner which have caused him to sell the club. He lost lots of money tendering for a shipbuilding contract as well as building a huge new head office. Also this years ACL has tons more prizemoney… all the way along.
StiflersMom said | May 14th 2009 @ 11:18am | Report comment
What I don’t get is if it is a FFA issue how come the players didn’t seem to know that?
As for being stingy. I’m sure 30 hours from Japan is the long route. If Con wants his team to perform he should make them as confortable as possible. Have you ever see the movie “Major League”, maybe he’s trying to relocate the team?
Tifosi said | May 14th 2009 @ 12:00pm | Report comment
burgerman,
thx for that info. I did know his business was struggling in the current economic climate, but was not sure why.
Pippinu said | May 14th 2009 @ 6:02pm | Report comment
When someone is doing something as a bit of a hobby, like, say, collecting coins and stamps, when your own personal financial circumstances change a little, you’ll spend a bit less on your hobby.
Isn’t it presumptuous of anyone to demand that someone should spend more of their own money on a hobby?
If tomorrow he decides this has cost him enough, surely he has the right to simply stop putting in his own money?
Midfielder said | May 15th 2009 @ 9:17pm | Report comment
Jes
Have you heard of Christian Esposito can you give us any details on him.. Has anyone heard of this kid .. he sounds the goods .. Fozza will have a heart attack if he looks at his coaches …
But with AC Milan chasing you and being picked in a Serie B side ( Albinoleffe ) he sounds like he is a real talent …
As a side issue Adelaide produce some good players for such a small city that is AFL dominated.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25470273-5006373,00.html
A MODERN Adelaide-born version of Italian super striker Christian Vieri is set to be torn between two countries after making his debut for Albinoleffe’s Serie B side at the weekend.
Christian Esposito is eligible to play for Australia and Italy due to his heritage.
He is also on the wanted list of glamour club AC Milan.
Esposito, 18, has attracted the attention of Australian national team talent scouts after rising from the grinding ranks of the tactically superior Italian coaching schools.
His father, Joe, lives in Campbelltown while his mother, Maria, lives in Bergamo, Italy.
Esposito received his first team call-up against Frosinone on Sunday after scoring five goals for Albinoleffe’s under-21 side, which plays in Italy’s famed Primavera national youth league system.
He was the youngest ever Albinoleffe player to make his debut, said father Joe Esposito.
“I’m proud of Christian,” he said.
“Playing for the Socceroos would be a dream for him.
“He wanted to come to Australia but I really want him to make a go of his career in Italy.”
Vieri rose to prominence when he returned to Italy after Marconi Stallions introduced the star to the game as a teenager before scoring 23 goals in 49 appearances for the Italian national side
Ben of Phnom Penh said | May 17th 2009 @ 9:15am | Report comment
I do hope that the talk of a boycott is primarily a beat-up as most reports have the players stating that they fully intend to play in Korea. They can only lose by not continuing in the ACL (less exposure, less football) however what is worse is the damage that they can do to Australia’s standing in Asia. It is the region’s premier football tournament and the strongest club competition that we engage in (until another club gets to the World Club Championships at least).
The Jets may be a management mess however they need to recognise that continued participation in the ACL is an issue that is bigger than them alone. I’d hate to think of the damage it would do to our World Cup bid, let alone the ammunition it would hand to Australia’s existing detractors in the region.