Viduka shows the way to embrace football’s roots

 
Davidde Corran Columnist

By , 5 Mar 2010 Davidde Corran is a Roar Expert

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The Australian Socceroos' Mark Viduka kicks the ball in the Australia v Japan opening Group F match at the Soccer World Cup in Kaiserslautern, Germany, Monday, June 12, 2006. This is Australia's first World Cup finals appearance in 32 years. AAP Image/Dave Hunt

Last Friday, the Melbourne Knights announced Mark Viduka would be the team’s number one ticket holder for the new Victorian Premier League season.

In an article on the Knights’ website, the former NSL club also revealed that former Socceroo Danny Tiatto would be joining the club for two games as a guest player.

Interesting news that mostly went unnoticed. In particular, it’s another fascinating chapter in Mark Viduka’s football life.

The thing that disappoints me most about the way many remember Viduka as a player are the doubts over his motivations when it came to the national team.

People have pulled out everything from his relatively low goal tally for the national team, through to his hesitation in making a definitive decision on the Socceroos over the last few years as evidence of his misplaced loyalties. Such doubts couldn’t be further from the truth.

My favourite story about big ‘Dukes’ comes from the lead up to the 2007 Asian Cup.

In mid-June 2007, Graham Arnold made two calls within a few days to Viduka who had just joined English Premier League side Newcastle United. Arnold asked him to come play for the Socceroos in the Asian Cup.

On both occasions Viduka refused saying he “needed the time off”. In the end, and despite publicly admitting how crucial to the Socceroos Viduka was, Arnold conceded defeat and moved on to trying to fill the Australian captain’s ample void.

Less then a week later though Arnold’s phone rang. It was Viduka. The then 31-year old explained to ‘Arnie’ that he hadn’t been able to sleep since his decision to miss the Asian Cup. Viduka had changed his mind and would be wearing the green and gold a few weeks later where he hit the best goal-scoring form of his international career.

The exertions of missing another off-season to play in the heat and humidity of South East Asia took it’s toll on Viduka’s body though, as he limped through the next two seasons with Newcastle.

Its safe to say that Viduka’s passion for the green and gold sabotaged the twilight of his Premier League career.

Mark Viduka’s decision to become the number one ticket holder at the Knights has once again shown his passion and loyalty for both his country and heritage.

In the Socceroos era of ‘Luca$h’, the former Leeds striker stands almost alone as being about something other then just the money.

For me Viduka and Tiatto’s, return to the Melbourne Knights is further proof of the need to reunite Australia’s fractured football community.

When the A-League launched five years ago, Football Federation Australia’s myopic focus on “the next generation” of clubs was the right one at the time. However, the time to re-connect with Australia’s football heritage passed long ago.

So how should FFA embrace the older generation of clubs while still ensuring the game has a bright financial future? So far I can only think of three much talked about options.

A-League division 2
A-League division 2 – three words that seem to illicit as many pleas of “yes please” as they do accusations of “europhilia” (as if it’s a bad thing to want Australian football to mirror some of the best elements of the world’s most popular leagues).

The idea of bringing together the strongest clubs from the state leagues (and possibly some new franchises that missed out on recent A-League licenses) into a national second division is certainly alluring.

However the continuing state of peril that North Queensland Fury find themselves in, (link) is a reminder of how fragile an existence much of Australian football is living in at the moment.

I don’t believe relegation and promotion is anywhere near as foreign of an idea to Australian sport as many believe, but certainly the A-League is still some way off being able to sustain such troubles.

The state leagues have managed to sustain themselves since the A-League launched and surely a united national league would only strengthen the financial position of the biggest clubs in these competitions.

FFA Cup
A national knockout competition open to almost all levels of the game. Many states already have similar competitions so surely a national version, that remains regional until the A-League teams come in, would be a viable alternative.

I certainly believe such a tournament would also be a good way for FFA to test the waters in football’s traditional backyards.

However, while many would like to see such a competition modelled on England’s FA Cup, in truth that’s a competition that has been faltering since the 1990’s (if not earlier). It’s a trend that is generally mirrored right across Europe. Despite recent renovations, Italy’s Coppa Italia still leaves most Italians feeling under whelmed.

On the flip side, while England’s FA Cup has lost it’s lustre since the Wembley final stopped being the only regularly televised game in England, the lack of an A-League free to air deal could be exploited to a cup tournament’s gain.

Keeping the Status Quo
It would be easy to assume that by leaving things as they are FFA wouldn’t be jeopardising the game’s future by trying any financially risky innovations, but I’m not so sure.

The longer Australia’s football past and present remains segregated; the game’s future will never reach its potential. The longer the older generation continues to get the cold shoulder, the harder it will be for FFA to reconnect with them in the future.

The big point that many keep coming back to is a fear of youths with ill-conceived ideas of national pride causing trouble at and around football events. Instead of combating this problem, I feel we’ve run scared.

There are great people at these clubs that have offered so much to the game in the past and they have more to offer in the future.

FFA shouldn’t let a minority hold back the growth of the game. Instead, along with clubs and local government, I’d like to see FFA actively use the game to tackle these problems. A brave approach of engagement, education and no nonsense tolerance.

Personally, while I have a preference for which approach should be taken and have written about it on this site in the past, I am more concerned by the thought of continuing to not do anything to embrace much of football’s roots then by which path to re-engagement we take.

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