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The million dollar question for Sydney’s football market is how more Sydneysiders can take to the A-League competition.
‘We Are Football’ is the new slogan of the day, yet it hasn’t bridged the gap in our community, as the missing millions have found it harder than ever to remain a part of the Sydney market when their teams have been forcibly pushed towards the sidelines and out of the spotlight.
Football is, as we all know, the biggest participation sport in Australia, with a rich history and number of expanding markets. The question is not how more Sydneysiders can fall in love with football.
The facts are, in essence, that Sydney FC has struggled to make inroads with the city’s football-going community and that Western Sydney Rovers is a proven failure.
Despite this, however, there are clubs that can fill the breach.
‘Bling FC’, inaugural A-League winners, has lost its battle to represent one city on its own. In a city of over four million, Sydney FC has not been able to fill its stadium, whether it be the SFS, Parramatta Stadium, Jubilee Oval or elsewhere. The people aren’t going. The people don’t have a strong enough connection to this team. It’s only a franchise after all.
It is here that the concept of a western Sydney team was first afforded currency.
By adding another Sydney team, much of the burden to represent the entire city could be lifted off the Paddington side. It would make it more accessible for football lovers to watch a western Sydney team play. It would mean they could make another choice.
But, as the talk of a West Sydney Rovers bid seemed just over the horizon, Ian Rowden’s consortium failed to make any progress and the team was scrapped altogether in December 2010.
The supposed answer in West Sydney Rovers is gone, but the problem remains. What could be the alternative to having two unsustainable franchise clubs with no existing fan base in the Sydney market?
It is here that the concept of reintroducing a ‘second’ Sydney team instead of a ‘western’ Sydney team has started to regain currency.
Regarding this shift in approach, commentator and journalist Michael Cockerill mentions that western Sydney is “the great missed opportunity for the game” with “three attempts to get an A-League team in… the game’s heartland, three failures.”
“Embarrassing?” he asks FFA Chairman Frank Lowy, who likes to blame the bid players on the issue, saying “we were let down by the people that were putting it together.”
The first glances in search for more concrete alternatives would be to the next level of football down the ladder. For Sydney, it’s the New South Wales Premier League. And, at a time where the FFA and the A-League need it the most, there is one Sydney team that is hungrier than all others to be back into that spotlight.
Everyone knows the talk is about the Sydney Olympic Football Club.
After their latest triumph in front of a record crowd of over 10,000 partisan fans, Cockerill again stated that Olympic had again made “a pointed reminder to the mandarins at Football Federation Australia, that’s for sure.” That message, he declared, was to “ignore the game’s ethnic origins at your peril.”
But what is Sydney Olympic, exactly? Who are their supporters and why are they still fighting not only for survival but for further glory? The point deserves further discussion in itself.
The club, founded as Sydney Pan-Hellenic in 1957 by Greek migrants, was a founding member of the National Soccer League, and played in all but one year between 1978 and 2004. It was when it helped to create the national format that it changed its name to Sydney Olympic.
While a host of other clubs in the competition bought land in the suburbs and created a base for themselves, Olympic has, for much of its history, never had a permanent home. The ‘Blues’ have played over the years at a number of venues across central, south and western Sydney including Wentworth Park, the SFS, Jubilee Oval, Shark Park, Belmore Sports Ground, Pratten Park, Leichhardt Oval and St. George Stadium.
After a tough time adjusting back into the NSW Premier League, Olympic finally seem to have the right team both on and off the park to deliver.
The SOFC board, headed by local businessman George Giannaros and which includes former Socceroo and Fox Sports pundit Mark Bosnich, seem to have finally found the right mix of passion, talent and results across the entire club. Theirs has been a unified effort to streamline a number of activities and initiatives through an efficient club office, whilst setting and exceeding impressive targets with the first team.
For Olympic, 2011 has proved to be their most successful and impressive year in almost a decade.
When Peter Tsekenis spoke to local media and Olympic fan groups of his appointment as Head Coach in September 2010, he mentioned that his decision to join Olympic centred around a number of challenges, not only for his personal development as a manager but the task to return glory to the side he played for almost a decade in the 1990s.
“I want to hear our ‘O – LYM – PIC’ chant roaring through Belmore once again,” Tsekenis had said, and he certainly did when the Blues scored impressive victories against Sydney FC and Sydney United in a top class year.
And, with an impressive record as player-coach at NSW Premier League rivals Bankstown, Tsekenis seemed like the perfect choice.
At Tsekenis’ disposal were a number of talented youngsters already at the club, including Phil Makrys and brothers Peter and Chris Triantis, as well as a host of new signings including pacy wingers David Gullo and Will Angel.
With the senior side in safe hands, the board has cleverly negotiated terms on a long-term lease of and improved facilities at Belmore Sports Ground, realised in agreements with a number of parties including Canterbury Council, the Canterbury Bulldogs, and State and Federal Parliaments.
In what could only be called a monumental achievement, Sydney Olympic FC has secured a long-term home for its competition matches and club operations.
Making immense progress already, Olympic successfully applied for its first Women’s Super League teams in 2011, bringing its commitment to player development to a new level in a most rapidly expanding sphere in the modern game.
And so, with a new first-grade manager, redevelopments at Belmore Sports Ground, women’s teams and other initiatives in play, the 2011 season kicked off in cracking style with three magnificent finishes from Alex Smith, now at Wellington Phoenix, including a curling free kick late on saw Olympic finish 3-0 winners on Round 1. Smith would go on to wreak havoc on opposition defences as he and strike partner Robbie Mileski chalked up over 20 goals between them in all competitions by seasons end.
And, for Olympic, from Round 7 there was no turning back from the top of the table, sealing NSW Premier League Minor Premiership with a home victory over APIA Leichhardt on the final day.
A great victory over bitter enemies Sydney FC in the inaugural Brett Emerton Cup preceded two more victories against rivals Sydney United, the second in the record-breaking NSWPL Grand Final with well over 10,000 passionate fans in attendance.
More importantly, though, the final was a celebration of football and was without any trace of the ethnic violence sometimes attributed to the passionate displays from ‘old soccer’.
2011 was, for Sydney Olympic, undoubtedly a success. Stability, progress, glory. The board has accomplished much off the park to guarantee the club has a long term home, a broader Youth academy and Womens teams, all with dedicated full-time technical directors and coaching staff. It has also put its faith in the right manager with an exciting squad that delivered trophies on the park.
And all this in the absence of huge sums of direct capital. Without FFA handouts. Without Foxtel money. Without exclusive rights to the market.
And, as such, Sydney Olympic deserve a go. With their pedigree and their record the club deserves a chance to offer another choice to the Sydney market, to bring a club back to the stage it belongs and to add its supporter strength and board stability to the A-League.
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