Cracks are showing in the Socceroos camp

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By Davidde Corran, 17 Jun 2009 Davidde Corran is a Roar Expert

Tagged:: football, Pim Verbeek, Socceroos, Tim Cahill

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Australia's Scott McDonald and Iraq's Haidar Hussain during the Australian Socceroos v Iraq World Cup qualifier. AAP Image/Dave Hunt

It’s been a rather curious week for Australian football. Set to the backdrop of an historic World Cup bid, there’s been equal doses of good and bad news.

A little over a week ago the Socceroos qualified for consecutive World Cups for the first time. There was no penalty shootout this time and, in truth, no fuss.

While you could be forgiven for expecting universal praise for the Socceroos after their historic achievement, it hasn’t been that way.

The criticism from some parts of the media and fans about how the national team has played, which has been prevalent throughout this campaign, has continued, many arguing that on the pitch the Socceroos have been boring.

At the very least, Australia hasn’t been convincing in many of their displays.

This criticism was then coupled with a media debacle off the pitch. The blanket media ban issued by Socceroos coach Pim Verbeek on his players in the lead up to last week’s match with Bahrain was unequivocally a mistake.

Despite these issues, the thing that’s really concerning me are the cracks that are beginning to appear in the Socceroos’ change-room.

Tim Cahill’s alleged, and that’s the key word here, misdemeanour at a Sydney nightclub has mostly flown under the radar. Unsurprisingly, my colleagues in the football media have been keen not to over play the incident, which could potentially be damaging to the game.

We don’t know what actually happened that night, and I wont speculate. Instead, I’d like to know why the players were out celebrating while in camp. There’s a difference between having a quite few in the hotel bar and going out clubbing in Kings Cross.

In truth, I’ve been worried about this for a while.

When I was in Sydney for the Socceroos game against Uzbekistan earlier this year, a source very close to the team told me of a late night sojourn three players took in the lead up to that match. Apparently they arrived back at the hotel in the very early hours of the morning to a very unhappy coach.

No suspensions or public punishment, though.

On top of that, did anyone else find the bushfire fund raising dinner ‘hosted’ by just three members of the national team curious?

If you didn’t, then I’ll tell you who did: the other members of that squad who weren’t invited and then had to pay for their own seats. Football Federation Australia had to pick up the tab and it was messy situation for all involved.

It doesn’t seem like the sort of incident that helps unify a team does it?

At the time, it was mentioned to me that while the team keeps winning, these internal problems will remain in-house. Well, they’re starting to leak.

Personally, Lucas Neill’s decision to select the team himself by picking up a yellow card against Qatar was even more revealing.

In the days after the Qatar match, Verbeek revealed that he hadn’t known Neill was planning such an action. That set alarm bells ringing in my head.

As Craig Foster eloquently explained last week, Guss Hiddink wouldn’t have let that fly. Not only was Neill’s behaviour unbecoming of the captain of a national team, I think it undermined Verbeek’s leadership.

So, Socceroos out late at night when in camp, innuendo that this isn’t the first time, and players making decisions themselves on when they’ll play.

It doesn’t look good.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a supporter of Pim Verbeek, and while, like many, I have concerns about how the Socceroos will fare next year at the World Cup, I think Verbeek’s earned the right to lead us to South Africa.

The respect he showed the Japanese media at his pre-match press conference yesterday also reiterated the good will he’s helped to build in the region for us.

But I’m still worried.

When a car windscreen gets a crack, it’s already in trouble. Eventually the bumps and shocks as the car drives along the road causes the crack to grow until eventually the window shatters or the windscreen is replaced.

The road to South Africa has already been a long and windy one. Let’s hope the rest of the way isn’t too bumpy.

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The Crowd Says (86) | Page 1 of Comments

sheek said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:07am | Report comment

Davidde,

I guess time will tell if you’re on the money or unduly worried. I don’t see what you see, but then I don’t follow football as closely either.

The team looks reasonably united to me, & aren’t inclined to share their tribulations with the media, another sign of a close-bound team.

I’m not fussed about Neill’s yellow card situation. Is it really a crime? And I think it’s great if management are willing to let the guys ‘let off steam’ with a few drinks. In too many instances, our world is becoming far too politically correct.

In another time, cricketer Andrew Symonds would have been lauded a likeable rogue. Today it seems, the cricketers can’t even sneeze without drawing a reproach.

I’m inclined to think Verbeek is handling things “the right way” so far. He’s dealing with grown men, & he’s letting them be grown men, warts ‘n all!

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Realfootball said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:22am | Report comment

Symonds may once have been lauded as a likeable rogue, but that would not have been good for the player or the sport. He would also not in those days have been paid a fraction of what he is now, nor had the media attention. Times and have changed and quite rightly so have expectations of how sports stars conduct themselves. Symonds is not a good role model for young athletes – he is a man with an alcholol problem who has lost most of the money he made from the sport. He needs help, not pats on the back. Neill’s actions with his yellow card were understandable – the problem was that he should have kept it to himself. It really isn’t a good look for our national team captain. However, the Uzbeck match story is far, far more disturbing. It is impossible to believe that in any other code, the players would not have been suspended, and they should have been in this case, without question. However, it has to be said there is no trace of problems on the pitch – not all. They seem like a very tight knit group.

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Slippery Jim said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:43am | Report comment

Lucas Neill is used to interfering (or should I say having ‘input’) at every level for West Ham, and obviously thinks he can make decisions over Pim’s head for the socceroos as well. Give the captaincy to someone more level headed like Schwarzer and he should pull his head in a bit…

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whiskeymac said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:46am | Report comment

“They seem like a very tight knit group.” not just the players but also the players and coach. Neill Cahill Shwarzer Emerton Kewell have all come out and defended Pim. if anything they are building an us and them mentality, which suggests a stronger untiy as opposed to a brittle one. As sheek said i dont see it either, but time will tell even though i think it was poor form on the fund raiser, whereas Neills yellow is cynical – who knows what Pim told him afterwards?

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Midfielder said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:51am | Report comment

DC

I cannot see what you see.

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Art Sapphire said | June 17th 2009 @ 8:56am | Report comment

Davide –

“We don’t know what actually happened that night, and I wont speculate. Instead, I’d like to know why the players were out celebrating while in camp. There’s a difference between having a quite few in the hotel bar and going out clubbing in Kings Cross. In truth, I’ve been worried about this for a while.”

What an absolute beat up!

The players have just finished another gruelling season in Europe and to top it off that have just qualified for the World Cup and you are suggesting that they have a few quiet ones instead.

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Brett McKay said | June 17th 2009 @ 9:01am | Report comment

Davidde, it’s interesting that your football colleagues were “keen not to over play the incident” of Cahill’s alleged indiscretion. From the resulting statements from the hotel and the FFA, that situation now looks like it may well have been nothing really, but we all know that had Cahill been an NRL or AFL player, the coverage would have been well different.

As for Neill’s “tactical” yellow, in the end, Pim’s not going to start any of the yellow holders anyway. So regardless of whether Verbeek knew of Neill’s plan or not, he obviously thinks its a good idea now.

I’m a bit like Sheek here, I don’t follow or understand football/soccer enough to be looking for these sorts of issues as you have. You might even say that I’m typical of the bandwagon-jumpers that climb aboard come World Cup time. So from this part-time-follower’s perspective, I think the team is travelling well. Verbeek is obviously working toward a set plan, and isn’t going to be distracted from that, no matter how much praise or cricticism he cops. And the players appear to be with him..

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Robbos said | June 17th 2009 @ 9:10am | Report comment

Brett,

Just because it happens to NRL or AFL players doesn’t make it right. From the reports provided nothing happened.
This might be the case with many NRL or AFL incidents as well and it’s not right. This guy is a world cup hero & to drag his name thru the mud to show how unfair it is for AFL or NRL players is not the correct way.

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Tom said | June 17th 2009 @ 9:12am | Report comment

This is a collection of rumours and half-truths spun into an article.

And I strongly disagree that the media ban was ‘unequivocally a mistake’. Verbeek looked at his players and made a decision that too much media may distract them from the Bahrain game after a short turnaround from a long trip. They then went and won the Bahrain game. The Daily Telegraph got upset about it, because the Daily Telegraph believes itself to be far more important than the success of the national team, but I can’t see any other effects.

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GeneralAshnak said | June 17th 2009 @ 9:18am | Report comment

The Cahill ‘incident’ is a furphy, as has been stated by those who where there and the police. It is not a story – someone was trying to get their chk chk boom 15 minutes of fame and it didn’t work.

As for the cracks in the NT? I agree that I cannot see what you see. The Socceroos and the coaching staff have been backing each other 100%. The on pitch displays have been very good (I don’t care about the ‘boring’ tag; I prefer the ‘We qualified for the World Cup’ tag any day). In all likelihood the reason these supposed indiscretions have not seen the light of day is because either, 1 they did not occur or 2 they have grown in the retelling to the point they resemble nothing of the original occurrence.

I think that to be able to accurately level this sort of criticism at the team and coaching staff sound examples with provable facts need to be presented. Until then it is speculation and hearsay.

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