Sydney's Shannon Cole (left) and Brisbane's Tommy Oar (right) during the round 25 A-League match between Brisbane Roar and Sydney F.C at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, Saturday, Jan. 30, 2010. (AAP Image/Dave Hunt)
It’s been a week of extremes for the A-League, from the invisibility of a week off to the thrilling finals matches in Wellington and Sydney.
The week just past has been a fascinating microcosm of how the promising developments for the wider Australian football community are sometimes the same factors that impede the growth of the domestic game.
The Catch-22s we have witnessed include:
Tommy Oar: to stay or go?
Tommy Oar is a prodigious talent, worthy of World Cup inclusion, and the excitement of his development this season has been one of the few bright sparks for the Brisbane Roar.
He is the sort of player who can lift up a club like the Roar on the park while also inspiring fans to get to Suncorp Stadium on a Saturday afternoon and pay the exorbitant ticket prices.
But Oar, with his level of talent and at his age, is surely destined for Europe, robbing the Roar and its fans of his promise and talents.
Catch-22: While we want the best Australian players in the A-League, we are better served if they are schooled in Europe for the greater good of the Socceroos.
A-League V Socceroos
The AFC international break last weekend, and to a lesser extent the Asian Champions League opening fixtures, couldn’t fall at worse time for the A-League.
The impact of the forced break for the A-League is magnified during finals football – particularly when it lands between a two-legged finals fixture – just as media traction is building into a crescendo as the grand final approaches, which inevitably hurts the competition, robbing it of attention in the press as other codes take the spotlight.
And thanks to the debilitating lack of marketing for the game, such disruptions are felt more acutely.
Thankfully the semis delivered plenty of excitement to revive interest in the series.
Catch-22: The internationalism of the game has been the cornerstone of the growth of the code in Australia, yet it also overshadows and interrupts the domestic game.
Nicky Carle: marquee man or not?
Carle is an undoubted talent, but is he a marquee man?
According to Sydney FC and Vitezslav Lavicka, who are reportedly set to pay $1 million for Carle, he is.
Carle will give Sydney FC some much-needed spark in the front third of the pitch; a creative outlet they have lacked this season.
But he is far from the marquee man the club and A-League need. To try and tempt non-A-League football supporters to get to games, the league needs marquees such as Robbie Fowler and Dwight Yorke; players who are marketable star names.
Catch-22: While we want to attract talented Australians of Carle’s ilk back to the A-League, teams can only do so by using the marquee dispensation, which is hardly the ideal use of the rule.
While the marquee rules can be changed to increase the number of players that can be signed under the dispensation, nothing can be done for the A-League when it comes to international disruptions and losing its talented youngsters to Europe.
These are the negative impacts of the game’s internationalism; the reasons why it will be incredibly difficult if not impossible for the A-League to challenge the more settled rival codes, which do not suffer such effects.
These are the glorious imperfections of the beautiful game Australian-style.
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Rob said | March 9th 2010 @ 3:41am | Report comment
Wrong time and place for this sort of article Adrian, The rest of us are busy enjoying a great finals series
AA said | March 9th 2010 @ 3:45am | Report comment
I agree with Rob. Wrong time and place. Concentrate on what’s happening right now.
Midge said | March 9th 2010 @ 4:50am | Report comment
What’s happening now is that us Kiwi’s are pulling better crowds than you lot in your own league haha.
Ricky J said | March 9th 2010 @ 1:10pm | Report comment
The Kiwi sideshow is over. All the remaining games are where it counts now.
Dogz R Barkn said | March 9th 2010 @ 10:37am | Report comment
But surely Adrian is correct in pointing out that finals is all about building momentum, leading up to a crescendo, and a week break in the middle of the finals series effectively stops all the momentum dead in its tracks.
AndyRoo said | March 9th 2010 @ 10:58am | Report comment
Normally I would say it would and for future years they need to make sure it doesn’t happen again but this year I think it worked out ok. I think the break helped for the SFC vs Melb game and the Phoenix vs Jets game for sure. If that Melbourne game was played only 14 days after the last SFC home game against Melbourne I don’t think it would have been as interesting. The extra week off also helped give the Adelaide vs Pohang and MV vs Beijing games some space.
It only works though when you have genuine exciting matchup’s. If MV lost by 3 at home and GCU beat the Jets the one week break would have been a disaster.
That said I live in Brisbane so I didn’t go a week without football which may be effecting my opinion. If that was an away game to some West Asian country played around midnight I probably wouldn’t have been so happy to have a week without the A league.
So I think the FFA dodged a bullet but just like the potential exodus of players on loan to make the world cup the dodging of the bullet seemed to be because of luck rather than good management.
Cpaaa 2018 said | March 9th 2010 @ 4:46am | Report comment
We definetly need two spots for the marquee role. NQ invested in “God”, and the all mighty could not deliver finals football alone. Nicky Carle is still growing as a footballer as is Jason Culina. The Australian marquee seriously needs to be considered by those clubs that can afford it.
Nicky will be looked at as a leader if he signs as a marquee . in my opinion, Nicky dont need that pressure. he is also known by the football family and not too well by mainstream.
When will the doors open to the Australian marquee spot ?
Punter said | March 9th 2010 @ 6:31am | Report comment
I agree we need an 2nd marquee status for clubs who can afford it, an Australian marquee. Imagine Carle feeding a Fowler like player for SFC.
Luke W said | March 9th 2010 @ 8:44am | Report comment
I’d prefer an Asian marquee than an Australian marquee. Still includes the Aussies, but also opens up the very technically sound East Asian countries.
Fivehole said | March 9th 2010 @ 9:36am | Report comment
I agree with Luke – Asian better than Australian. Ideally, there’d be 3 marquees – International, Asian and Australian, but as most clubs don’t even use their current marquee role, this is a pipedream. Plus $ wise the league is not there yet.
TheMagnificent11 said | March 9th 2010 @ 10:17am | Report comment
This is all well and good. However, the reason why the FFA haven’t introduced it is because only two or three clubs could afford to have more than one marquee (most can’t even afford to have a one “genuine” marquee). The FFA want to keep the competition as even as possible because it’s better for overall league crowds numbers.
When the FFA negotiate their next TV rights deal they’ll get more money for the A-League rights (they’ll probably get more for the Socceroos TV rights as well). This will lead to more handout money for each club. That would be the ideal time to review the marquee rules.
Tifosi said | March 9th 2010 @ 4:59am | Report comment
I liked this Q&A from the SMH between Craig Foster and Han Berger, shows how much things still need to improve but im sure it will get better over time
“We still have a lot to learn”
http://www.smh.com.au/sport/football/we-still-have-a-lot-to-learn-20100306-ppms.html
rovingto2011 said | March 9th 2010 @ 6:01am | Report comment
Another week another impediment ? At least foz/berger were constructive. The starting point here seems to be ‘where are the negatives this week’ and fit each issue to suit.
Geez Adrian, do u need a cuddle or something?
Realfootball said | March 9th 2010 @ 7:44am | Report comment
The FFA, as in many other aspects of their management of the A-League this season, have been woefully inadequate in addressing the marquee issue.
The system clearly isn’t working, but simply allowing one Australian marquee in addition to one international marquee would solve the problem. It is so obvious that it astounds me that the FFA don’t act.
But action isn’t the FFA thing, is it? They sit on their hands and tilt at WC windmills. What a travesty.
AA said | March 9th 2010 @ 9:43pm | Report comment
You’re actually spot on there RF
Davstar said | March 9th 2010 @ 7:57am | Report comment
1st point: Young players are going overseas for the greater good of our national team and also to develop as a player, players like Ora, Vidosic, ditj etc should be going overseas to better there career if they have potential to become a great player. However You must remember older players are returning such as perth trio and Culina thus it simply works as a trade off system young socceroos leave older socceroos return. The A-league will lose Ora but soon will gain Chipperfield (see what i mean). So overall going overseas for young players isnt bad at all in the long terms its actually better because one day they will also return.
2nd: Of course the socceroos get the spot light they are our nations bright weather they be Domestic-roos or Euro-roos we all want our nation to succeed and every player wants to put on the green n gold. Every country in the world fees the same way why shouldnt we be any different, personally i think this A-league finals series has been very successfull so far especially in regards to the Fenix and Sydney FC. Couple that with Socceroos qualifying with 20,000 socceroos starved qld fans coming to watch them in the pooring rain i think its worked out well.
3rd:I have to completely agree Carle is overated, we aussies tend to overate our players sometimes. Carle wont return however, he’s finally getting game time even though he’s playing pretty average. But i think we will return soon but i hope not as a marquee because i doubt anywhere in the world he would be a marquee player, he’s very average imo.
whiskeymac said | March 9th 2010 @ 8:49am | Report comment
good points and interesting article. cant see the harm in the questions even during finals. better to have articles like this published than swept away – surely the people who read these forums arent going to stop watching the games because someone has suggested what makes the game strong can also hinder it?
the aim is to continue to develop players like Oar so we can replace them. and who is to say his next season will be as impressive – Zullo and Kruse (what a goal he scored recently) all went through a dip after their first seasons. (Djite and Burns are off the radar (at the moment) after leaving also). the NYL is the future for the game (obviously) and just like the academies in Holland and other exporting countires (France) so long as we can churn out good players we’ll be onto a winner in this respect. (am glad someone posted the Berger interview. Some very interesting insghts there into the coaching and its effect on players development).
further its better to have Oar here for a few seasons than not at all (see all the players overseas like Davidson in Portugal, who we wont see develop at all unless they play for the roos)
As was mentioned above replacing them with returning roos and overseas players is natural too – CCM just signed Rose from Romania for example for 2 years…and players like Burns, Sterj, Coyne, Culina etc add experience – so that hopefully there is something more to watch for the punters than park standard football (to misquote Towser).
carle may be overated but he is still someone who wld enhance the league and the SFC team. if Hernandez is worth 700K or whatever they paid ofr him, then Carle wld be too. whether he is the marquee tha was envisaged 5 years ago is debatable – and like others ithink the system needs to be reviewed now. they have junior marquees, why not an aussie marquee and a foreign one outside of the cap. not all clubs cld afford it, but then again not all clubs can afford a marquee in the first place or even have one.
Asia v Finals v HAL v FFA Cups… bigger squads? Using the NYL players more for some games? the berger article suggested only 10% of NYL players get a game in the HAL. not very good… theres a whole team of players to boost a squad if need be. it may make the eam weaker for some games but thats the reality of small squads and increased games. even the big clubs in europe get fixture congestion – its the price of success. suck it up Melbourne, surely its better to be there than not, and if porfessionals in other leagues can play 2 games a week why cant our boys? its not as if the season is very long!
Hammer said | March 9th 2010 @ 9:37am | Report comment
is Tommy Oar really worthy of World Cup inclusion ? … a little perspective is needed here – excellent debut against ideal opponents … but still Indonesia are only ranked 137 in the world … big call to give him a spot – surely the Olympics and Asian Cup is the next level he should be considered for – not the W/Cup …
AndyRoo said | March 9th 2010 @ 9:41am | Report comment
He’s a good tidy footballer, I think his attributes are suited to international football and should have a long national team career.
He won’t go the World Cup though. Their are jsut too many players inf ront of him with really good CV’s.
Bresiano, Emerton, Kewell, Cahill, Vidosic and Holman. That’s 6 attacking midfielders allready and their is still Carle and Garcia (regualr for Hull) in the mix.
AndyRoo said | March 9th 2010 @ 9:37am | Report comment
Tommy Oar: to stay or go?
If players leave to go to good clubs and leagues then I don’t mind so much. Losing players to Romania and China or to go to Greece and not get game time is depressing.
Seeing Tommy Oar live was close to the only reason I persevered with going to Roar games this year after Frank was sacked and it all went tit’s up. Oar wasn’t even set to start this season and didn’t play a part in round one even though he was available so it’s been a meteoritic rise. But have seen him play plenty of good games this year and even got to see his national team debut as well so that has provided some closure. I wish him well and really there are not many leagues where players would knock back the chance to go to Feyenord.
A-League V Socceroos
In general I see this being a big problem, the week where we had a rest for the Kuwait game was the worst. It was January and we were getting good crowds and the A league disappeared for a whole week and the news from an away game in Kuwait didn’t make up for it. We would have been better off playing on with weakened A league squads. That gap meant Brisbane who had their second biggest crowd and a home win over the Fury didn’t get another home game for a month.
The break in the finals actually worked out ok though. It put a bit of a gap between the SFC and Melbourne games rather than play 3 in 3 weeks; it also meant the good news from the Phoenix kept rolling on.
Could have been a disaster if say GCU won but it worked out ok …this time.
Nicky Carle: marquee man or not?
I am torn on this, I am kind of over the fawning over getting an overseas name but I know that’s an important driver for a lot of people to take an interest in the A league. After all if you don’t have pay TV it’s largely 11 unknown players vs 10 unknown players and that bloke that used to play for Australia.
If you can get a Robbie Fowler than grab him but their rare so I don’t mind some teams just trying to improve the on field product overall. A Cullina or Carle may not be sexy but they do play better football than most A league players and help contribute to a good game. I wouldn’t be opposed to just scrapping the Marquee rule and just allowing the clubs to spend another million dollars if they want. Maybe they can’t find an ex big name who wouldn’t prefer the West Asian money so they could instead bring over 2 or 3 Tico’s for etc that raise the level of the team in a way just adding one player can’t.
Realfootball said | March 9th 2010 @ 10:19am | Report comment
The reality is that while a player like Nicky Carle may not be the marquee player an A League club wants, he is the kind of player an A League club can afford. What is the alternative? Over the hill Premier League players?
Money is the issue, always. Our clubs simply don’t have the financial muscle to go after true marquee players.
TheMagnificent11 said | March 9th 2010 @ 10:39am | Report comment
I agree with Realfootball. In most cases our clubs cannot afford genuine marquee players. I think marquee system should be changed to be more like the system in the MLS. Clubs have to great approval from the MLS to sign a marquee player. If they get it, the MLS pays a sizeable portion of the player’s salary e.g. what the Galaxy do with Beckham. The FFA would have develop some sort of point system to determine who qualifies and how much they each point is worth in terms of financial assistance.