Need to move to a two legged round of 16 + a two legged final, a one legged final won’t work in Asia

That’s not a bad idea … my reading of the tea leafs is the FFA are not quite prepared to take on the AFL & NRL head to head at this stage.. They (FFA) are more concerned about laying down the foundations of a broad based national domestic competition, with a five month window (Oct, Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb) when they have little competition… the push back further into the AFL & NRL season this year with the 27 rounds will be interesting to watch…

Its a difficult call as you said … maybe and this is pulled of of thin air as I was writing this reply is the FA cup style competition if started during late March or early April should keep most A-Leagues sides playing for a few weeks.. The competition may not be as intense but the state and association teams would throw everything at them…

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KB

I do doubt, however, that Pohang will be the most successful club, despite my lack of surprise in their success to this date – FC Seoul are more likely to progress to the semi-finals, than the Steelers. I can’t see them beating a Scolari-led on aggregate. Same goes against FC Seoul, for the semis.

It’s looking like a Nagoya – Bunyodkor final, to me. That would be an exciting fixture.

Maybe one of the problems is how the game is broadcast (it just feels amateurish at times) and or the crowds (which wont improve w/o better marketing). When comparing a game from say (at one end of the spectrum to the other) the EPL and Asia the crowds/ atmosphere can appear woeful. IMO this also makes the game feel amateurish – outside of a few exceptions from Japan and MV (maybe some in the middle east but i aint seen them yet). Will that ever change? Hopefully. part of the attraction in footbal is the vibrancy generated from the crowds – if it looks and sounds like a defunct pre-season cup game it becomes less interesting for the neutral. Is it why the MV and SFC games register longer than the NJ or CCM games? Maybe. I hope that the marinators get some taiko drums going one season – or a viking horn…. something to help generate atmosphere in the crowd and on the TV =)

(*as were Perisik, Chonburi, Pohang, ACL final and the entire CCM campaign games were entertaining for some of the less than generous rival supporters and doomsayers)

Good point re the eurosnobs … I asked once at training one night what league would you watch … this is on the basic that the A-League is crap.. generally Scotland, Greece, in fact most leagues outside, England, Spain, Italy, Germany with France & Holland acceptable…. but even then a match between Hull & West Ham … was nothing to get excited about … my take many want only Champions League quality & standards .. meaning outside the top say 20 clubs in the world they seem to consider not up to standard..

It may not be up to the same standard as the Euro Champions League… but it is only a matter of time.

Asian Football has come such a long way over the past decade or so, with a number of respectable emerging national teams and leagues. If I were European, I would be very afraid.

Great points with regard to the professional development of the various leagues around Asia, as our leagues improve and the competition gets both fiercer and more knowledgeable we will start to see the respect of other federations begin to grow. Except maybe in UEFA, the eurosnobs will take quite some time to acknowledge any real improvement in Asia – sometimes I think they just consider us to be a slightly larger version of Oceania…

Das,
Yep, I would agree 100% with you on that one…

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KB

However, when it comes to the ACL, MV is 4th best credential side from the A-league in it’s short history.
What Adelaide did last year, after beating a Japanese team that finished ahead of Gamba in the J-League, they then beat a Rivaldo led Uzbek side to make the final.

Newcastle also made it thru the to the next round, even though the rules had changed are also ahead of MV.

While SFC, who like MV lost out in the group stages to the eventual winners, well at least SFC did not lose to Urawa reds either home or away & only lost out on goal differences. You will find that even SFC with it’s poor record after the first season in the A-League has a better record than MV in the ACL.

Of course all this can change next year, then you can brag, but not now.

I agree with the title of the piece though believe it is the domestic respect that we need to garner. The inter-federation respect will follow.

I honestly think that if there was a global champions league, there will be far less eurosnobs as I believe that japanese and other asian clubs can give a lot of the european sides a run for the money. I’ll back Gamba Osaka over the likes of Celtic and Rangers anyday.

And I would rather say that we made the final and lost to a top team than have to tell them that the furtherest we ever got in Asia was going out in the group stage after getting rolled by some mob from Thailand.

Getting back to the serious discussion…

Ben – I think Adelaide’s two years of participation in the ACL have gone some ways as to broadening the horizons of football fans down here. Probably more so the second campaign, when we had the honour of taking on some of the bigger teams in the region. Conversations I used to have even two years ago with my mates revolved around EPL and A-League. Now J. League and K-League have started to enter the discussions, albeit not to the degree of EPL. People just want to know at this point what sort of players are there, what the standard is like, etc. I think it’s a sign that people are becoming interested in what is going on in the rest of the region. This can only be a positive thing for ACL, and I hope that the ethusiasm I sense from my friends translates into the wider football public and we get some good crowds for our group games next year.

Where are we at presently. Good question. Lets take the most prominent leagues as I see it only 4 stand out.Ours,China,Japan South Korea. Theres some money flying around in the Middle East but I dont see Strong professional leagues using Japan/Korea as yardsticks. China could be but theyve had internal(some may say corruption) problems. But Chinas potential in football is enormous. India is also has great potential,but the money is going into cricket. The AFC need a lot of effort there. Dont see Uzbekistan (despite Scolari) having a big league maybe only ever one or two clubs there.
The Middle East has enormous potential as a group League given the Petro dollars available but individually all nations seem too small. Iranians love football but are very insular to outside views(been there) would have to change dramatically ,politically to integrate into a broader professional set up. So setting up professional football in Asia has a myriad of problems not seen in Europe,where historically Football has a long professional tradition in most countries. This has resulted in an evolving hierachy where the biggest countries with the biggest economies have the elite leagues(Except Russia of course for obvious reasons). The best players in Europe graduate to these leagues & now they suck up the best of the rest of the world. Asia hasnt had time to develop this historical football hierachy,so needs to give Asian football development deep thought in order to produce quality leagues. To fast track that it means following the historical leads of Europe & having a few big Leagues for the elite in our case,primarily Asian players. I’ve got no problem with Vision Nepal or whatever but some of these countries for the various reasons I’ve stated will never have big professional football Leagues. I suppose the AFC have made a start in this respect by setting up a set of criteria of professionalism that countries have to meet in order to participate in the ACL. Thats fine but improvement (for the ACL)will only happen if the best Asian players are in it(Thai bloke to Melbourne). Also then attracting better players from around the world. We want situations where players in the rest of the world see more value in the A/J League than the English championship or second division Germany(such as Josh Kennedy has done) It may happen naturally as in Europe in which case ,time itself will take care of forming the Big Asian Leagues. So I suppose to answer the question were at the embryonic stage of the ACL as a professional football comp. I think the AFC have put thought into its development,but not enough in my book in recognising that like Europe they cant all be the EPL or Serie A,La LIga,Bundesliga.

A key for the ACL success is strong domestic support for the competition. It is starting to enter the lives of Australian football supporters and no doubt crowds will reflect that next season as both Adelaide and Melbourne fans have tasted the competition before, want more and more importantly are somewhat more aware of the opposition. No longer are they just quirky teams from countries we’ve only ever seen in an atlas but teams whose coaches we discuss, whose players we’ve seen tussle with the Socceroos, whose domestic form we may have some understanding of.

This needs to happen in a number of key countries (Japan, Korea, China, Uzbekistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia) for the support for the competition to generate interest in the minds of the broader sporting public. Adelaide went some way to achieving this in their last outing. When countries like Indonesia, with their great support for domestic football, start putting out more competitive teams then we will see a rapid broadening of support for and interest in the ACL.

Fulls stadiums create a media spectacle, and with that comes interest from the casual punter. Getting these people interested in ACL results when their local team is not playing is the measure. Then we’ve made it.

Newcastle haven’t exactly been extraordinary, either, so I would have expected people to have forseen that result a long time ago. I had actually predicted 5-0, so Pohang even exceeded my expectations.

Pip, let’s not forget that Melbourne weren’t playing game after game, at that point. And you should keep in mind Adelaide’s rematch at the Club World Cup, if you want to criticise.

I was disappointed to see Kashima knocked out of the tournament – there must be something about Ogasawara – but I’ll be putting all my attention into Pohang and Nagoya, from this point onwards. Dragan’s return as Nagoya’s coach has been amazing for the team, and their game against Kawasaki should be fantastic. Pohang’s a bit unlucky to be playing Bunyodkor, though. Hopefully they can continue their form, into the semi-finals.

Just because it works in Europe doesn’t mean it will work here. We need to go our own way, and reward the fans and players by giving them the best finale to a tournament possible. Right now the AFC isn’t doing that.

now you know we’ve been over this many, many times.

Personally, I don’t see copping a 5-0 shellacking as something to be proud of.

However, I retain much pride in the fact that we were able to lose 4-3 against the same mob (and were actually in front on two seperate occasions), and both Arch and Carlos weren’t even playing!!

It’s a classic case of the two best teams in the comp meeting very early in the piece – it was a tragedy for the football loving public the world over.

Papa excellent point on Scolari would love to have him at the Mariners…

Tow .. your past threads and posts on the need for 5 to 6 to 8 strong leagues comes to mind … what’s your take on where we are at present…

As for Europe, who cares? We have the ACL in a federation that is full of developing nations with a geography and demography unmatched by any of the other federations. Each year we get stronger and eventually we’ll have a broader range of leagues that are comparable to the better leagues in other federations. Remember that Adelaide were defeated by Gamba and then went on to defeat the African champions. We’re not that bad and good showing in 2010 by Asian nations will help underscore this.

Wow Scolari to coach in the ACL … Sensational is right, the right word; this league is really going to be a premier competition in Asia with such big names coming into it to coach… What we need now in Australia is to rise to the challenge to try to lure some big names to coach and to assist if only on a short term advisory capacity… Our Australian clubs need to inject more professionalism and ambition with better planing into our Australian clubs to make a greater impact and inroads into the ACL…

It was very disappointing from an Australian perspective when coaches MacKinna and GVE Newcastle and CCM respectfully bowed out; mainly due to their lack of experience of how to manage a team when out of season during ACL participation… This has to be addressed immediately by the FFA with some help in finding ways to keep these teams match fit during out of season, non-activity

This Asian comp is surly the greatest prize of all in our part of the world in any code’s club football and should be treated with greater respect from all Australians… I can see this happening when SFC finally get a second crack at it after this years comp… Can’t wait… PS and GCU FC..

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KB

No suprise to me regarding the English attitude to “foreign” football. I grew up with it. Born to rule in football(& in other areas). Except the reality is they dont. England may have invented football,but they didnt create it. The EPL is dominated by foreigners.
Annoying yes. Wind & piss yes.
Also give me Gamba rather than any team in the EPL outside the top few teams. Midfielder mentioned the 5 or 6 strong leagues in Asia. I firmly believe this is the way to go. Concentrate all the best players in Asia into these leagues & theres a chance the ACL can produce quality football maybe not ever ManU,Barca level but certainly just below it.
It makes sense also economically as there are not that many rich Asian nations who can afford to spend spare cash on the relative frivolity of upholding a Professional football League.
Interest will grow here as it grows throughout Asia. Lets face it the Koreans have yet to be convinced(judging by crowds) & football has been an estabilished traditional sport,mainstream much longer than here.