Sorry, if you get offended, but I have played in Europe and played at the top level here in Australia and I would choose Europe any day to build my understanding of the game off a professional grounding setup. Australian football has a long, long, long way to go, before, we even get close to the professionalism and training they have in Europe. The boy should be allowed to stay and train and play, he would be better off there.

I agree with the article writer, I think FIFA’s / FFAs rules are wrong and we will see Aussie kids leaving Australia and playing in England, Scottish, and Euro county shirts in the future, because of this law. We will loose our kids to foregin shores for good. As we did with Craig Johnson, who played for Liverpool and England in the 80s. When Craig was 16 in Newcastle, he went to Newcastle KB United and was told by a 3-4th rate coach Alan Vest to leave because he wasn’t good enough. He also wore the England shirt instead of the Socceroos Green and Gold…….Think about it.

Watching the A-League here this year, I see marked improvement in many areas of the game, admin, marketing etc, but at a football level, I feel we are going backwards. We need to bring-up better players, better coaches and better dynamic to the game here. Then we will get a better product in view of the football public and for them to enjoy what they are watching.

I hope I have added some fuel to this debate and article. Maybe the FFA will also see it and start to allow our kids to develop via a professional bridgiing contract that could be easily introduced via the FFA and the club in question. This could have a dramatic increae to our game here in Australia. Reason being, we need to have our kids see what Europe has to offer and how they do things over there will benifit us in the long run.

KR//

Stopping young people from travelling the world to play sport is wrong in my mind.

Players leaving overseas just creates an open door for someone else, instead of keeping our young players in a cage.

We would never have heard of players like Chris Payne, Osama Malik or Taj Minniecon if we stopped people going overseas.
The more the merrier I reckon and even better if they come back rich and famous.

i also think though there could be some bluff in al this. the likelihood being , unless he was amazing, he prob wont reperesent england etc. so i wonder that if he choses to snub austrlaia he may well be snubbing his best opportunity to play international football altogether?

The interesting point here is that the kid is eligible to reside in the UK anyway through his parents.

Pippinu, Adelaide just signed up a 16 y.o. midfielder, Costa. It will be interesting to see how he develops and with a small squad he is likely to get some game time to strut his stuff.

but I know that wasnt your point.. as a general proposition kids need to be protected and educated and developed. but who is to say that that cannot happen in Villa as opposed to the HAL? i thought the idea behind FIFA’s push was to adress what amounts to child slavery by belgian clubs, and the trawling of african talent by some less scrupulous but wealthy countries. Truly commendable. but sadly the implication of the law and as it is being imposed catches everyone. Did FIFA mean for aussie kids to stop that behaviour? the law seems to be having a big impact in situations re oz. ie where (assumption here) first world educated class type kids cannot go to europe (parents being poms) or where seemingly legitimate excepetions like Kofi Danning cant play for Austrlalia outside of friendlies.

actuall re reading it all ,this wasnt necessarily your point either. but the Danning farce was something i wanted to bring up – albeit witha lot of hot air included.

Perhaps the argument needs to be whether 18 is too old rather than whether an age limit should be imposed at all.

The team boasted Joe Cole and Carrick.

But virtually everyone else disappeared into oblivion.

Interestingly, there were two Australians: Garcia, who ultimately did get a chance playing EPL with Hull; and Michael Ferrante, who two seasons back left the Victory to join the Nix, where he has hardly been sighted.

Every young, aspiring player should read the article, so they understand that being within an touching distance of making it big, can still be like a million miles away.

I agree it would be like a dream come true for a 16 yo (for an EPL club to show some interest – although I’m not sure if many at that age will understand the long tortuous path ahead of them to just get a sniff at actually playing for the first team).

Even pre-dating the A-League, we have sufficient examples of 17 and 18 year olds playing senior games in our comp before getting success overseas – this should be the primary focus of the FFA and the A-League – giving senior experience to the very best 17 and 18 year olds.

It would seem Villa and the other clubs have a lot more scouts and, more likely, contacts here than the HAL clubs… or possibly the parents sent off a dvd?

and if there was a choice on the table between training with Aston Villa or (insert name of any HAL club) i guess the choice was easy?If a 16yo and his parents have the chance to train at a big EPL club how bitter would they be to be denied this opportunity to train and “potentially” play on the big stage?

Here is my question. How is it possible that Villa knows about this 16 yo ahead of the A-League clubs? Would the Villa academy (over the next two years) be valuable than a 16 yo getting senior experience in an A-League club? (recalling that it might be years before he gets to play against senior players)

Coincidentally, only yesterday I put up a thread that suggested a replacement for the current salary cap regime that would give A-League clubs a huge incentive to sign such 16 year olds, and have them in the squad as actual back-ups.