Addressing the exodus of A-League players

Jimbo I think you are right

MC, early NSL days (70s) this was not a problem, especially a move to Asia to play professional football. Very few Aussies went overseas to play professionally. Towards the end of the NSL it started to become more of a problem, but mainly to Europe. The big thing that set it off I think was the success of the AIS in producing good young players. The AIS set up an excellent football school and started churning out players like Viduka, Popovic, Emerton, Chipperfield, Cahill, Skoko, Aloisi, Sterjovski, Kewell etc etc. These players got better and they got attention, started playing in the big leagues and it snowballed from there. Since the A-League started, it continues and the big international exposure of the Asian Cup and the Asian Champions League is getting more interest from big Asian clubs snapping up bargains as well as European clubs. We’ve still got an excellent AIS academy and new academies are springing up in the other states as well. Junior development is getting bigger and national and state technical directors are being given full time paying jobs. Now of course, we have the FFA’s Youth League as a stepping-stone and curtain raiser for the A-League. The production line gets bigger and longer. Not to mention the player traffic in the opposite direction – with the greatest percentage of foreign based players in our national football competition than there has ever been – and most of them aren’t marquee players either. Are the player movements a problem? Yes. Can Australian football survive it? Yes it will.

Just stating a partially obvious point - - whatever the numbers of NSL players heading overseas was - - the HAL will appear 'worse' (so to speak), because of only 8 teams compared to at times 16 NSL sides with however many recent and future NSL sides on the periphery. Channelling all the best players into only 8 teams, means individual sides will be harder 'hit'. However, again, the issue will be in spreading the talent more thinly (in the short term at least) in the next few years moving to at least 12 sides - - well, again, the obvious is that it will seem as though all the best players will go................which.........as Redb pointed out, MUST be the case for the HAL to be a worthy league. To be a great league it somehow has to pass through this phase. But can it. ah well, as Dally Messenger suggested, any Australian team of the nations best footballers would be world beaters.

Jimbo - and that is where I think Pippinu is so right. We have to look at the Eredivise, the TurkLig and other leagues with a 'feeder' element to them to analyse what business models they use - how they balance the requirements to have a league with its own quality and integrity and domestic public support, with the commercial imperative to keep producing players that are attractive transfer targets.

Millster, the Jets haven't picked up any silverware this year, but since the last GF and if they go ahead with the $1.2M sale of Joel Griffiths, they would have grossed close to $5M in transfer fees. Gate receipts might be down a few hundred thousand, but the overall financial position is not as bad as the Con is making out. There are cheers as well as tears every time he lets one of his big stars go. Running a football club (any code) is a business. The attraction of the A-League players to big spending overseas clubs is a financial plus. Spend it wisely? There’s another sporting thesis to ponder. Reinvesting in junior players, skills and facilities would be a wise move that will be repaid in future transfer markets and the cycle will continue.

Jimbo - in almost your last para you touch on an aspect that we haven't seen really discussed yet but which is vital I think. Clearly the A-League is acutely aware of the capitalisation of both existing clubs and new entrants, and is worried about the financial instability that we saw in the NSL and that we see across the smaller end of world football as well in other codes (NBL anyone?). A key positive of the strong demand for A-League players is that, if properly managed, this creates funds for clubs which can increase their stability and development. One of the few arguments in my mind for the salary cap (and many would know I don't like the cap in general) is that those clubs can't just splurge their windfalls on other players, apart from on the few marquee/concession spots. But this whole area needs some more attention in my opinion. Clearly the A-League will continue to be a feeder comp to some extent, and influxes of money will be a regular feature. At both club and FFA level there needs to be good cooperation and management so that these funds are invested in worthwhile things, rather than squandered or frittered away.

Millster, Good article. I was writing one along similar lines when I saw yours. There’s also an article in Fox Sports today about it. http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,24979167-5000940,00.html It’s probably not a great idea to change the rules to let clubs pay players more salaries if they can’t afford to pay more to the players anyway. Paying players more is not always the answer, it hasn’t been for Newcastle or SFC this year. What was better value for SFC this year – John Aloisi at $1.4M or Shannon Grant or Kofi Danning or Brendan Gan at about $30-40K. You could have bought 40 of the best players in the Youth League for the same money outlayed on Aloisi. Not that I’m trying to pick on Aloisi – just for salary comparison purposes. A lot of people went to the last SFC game to see that “exciting new Ghanaian kid” rather than see if John Aloisi was going to score (or even get a run). Mark Bridge has given SFC fans about the same entertainment value as Aloisi. Kantarovski or Zura served the Jets better this season? For the professional players its great – the ones who can get more money make a better living out of the game, get worldly experience in different leagues. If they’ve played in Europe or Asia it’s great for the Olyroos, Socceroos or U20s in their next International or Asian competition to have their experience. There will be others who return to the A-League and add that experience as well. The younger ones get a break they mightn’t have had with fewer opportunities and no players leaving. The young player who aspires to be a professional footballer now has the best chance to make a career out of it than they ever did – male or female. Something we didn’t have when we were their age and its partly due to the transfer market. The professionally hardened Socceroos are also performing better as a team than they have in the past and are getting results and generating revenue for the FFA. I don’t think its destroying the A-League competition across the board either. In my opinion Perth and Adelaide are better teams and are better to watch than they were in V1.0 of the A-League. What would the league be without players like Dadi, Charlie Miller, Cassio, Zullo, Reid, Jamieson, Danning, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. The player transfers are also a big source of revenue for the clubs, especially if they bought them cheaply or raised them from their own junior league and will help the long term financial viability of clubs. Sure, there’s a downside to the transfer market and the player rotation and the player changes, but we as Australian football fans just have to live with it, especially in the next few years. The A-League can’t generate enough revenue yet to hold on to all the players and stop them going. Taking a gamble on so called big name players may be taking a bigger risk than investing in more local players, giving them better training, skill development and professional experience. Maybe they couldn’t do any worse than some marquee players we’ve had. And they are only young – they will have more incentive to try harder and play better – even if it’s only to get the attention of the J-League and European scouts.

RedB - you sum up the dilemma very well. On a small point I think some leagues in Europe do have salary restrictions (eg I seem to recall that the German Bundesliga - a very major league - has a cap of % club revenues) but I am sure these are both larger and more flexible than the strict and small A-League model. I see merit in your thoughts from one perspective but on the other I have to ask how one would motivate the 'small' clubs to strive for something better. If a set of Aussie super-clubs were allowed to compete without salary cap and other restrictions then we would of course get some joy hopefully from their being our 'standard bearers' but that would be at the cost of other Aussie clubs feeling all the more distant from the action - and again the erosion of the motivation and aspiration that flows through the whole football system would occur. I'm not saying I disagree totally, but I do find this issue difficult and vexing. As you know I'd like to see a major relaxation of the cap across the board - but at the same time I acknowledge that our league and clubs are not yet mature enough to bear this.

Millster, That makes sense for Europe and I assume no salary caps. I guess I'm wondering how any of the Australian clubs with the salary cap can compete with the likes of the Asian super clubs if held back by the cap. I think also the quality of the A League is limited somewhat by it's player talent. If the best players get poached or only stay for one season it makes it difficult for anyone bar core fans to keep engaged. Lose a few key players and your on the way down the ladder. The salary cap does it's job by keeping a level playing field, but it more often than not ensures weaker Aust teams in the ACL. I'm saying keep the A League, but accept it will be 2nd tier (mainstream popularity) domestic sporting comp and allow the bigger clubs to play on the level playing field without the limitations of the cap. Remember, most other countries do not have competing football codes to keep them at the forefront of the hearts and minds. Look at the growth of AU's popularity with its ACL success, now that they be repeated by another Aussie team but most likely the Aust teams are at a big disadvantage which self limits their domestic popularity. Maybe tha'ts OK by the FFA? An example is Melb Victory, they dropped out of the ACL fairly quickly and played in front of crowds of only 25,000 against Asian clubs at home. In the 2007 GF they pulled 55,000 and agaisnt Sydney 50,000, that's a big drop. It lessens the value of the ACL games without success, AU shows how much difference ACL success makes to a club's popularity. Redb

RedB - yet again we agree then- on the first para at least - scary isn't it. :-) On the Super 14 style comp I see that as hard to achieve as the structure of world football is based on a heirarchy from domestic to continental leagues etc as is already happenning. I agree that the ACL is key in building domestic football (which may be in practise very similar to a S14 style thing if the same handful of clubs from the same handful of countries regularly qualify) but I also think a self-sufficient Australian League is a pre-requisite. In any case the fight for those ACL spots is a very meaningful one and would be completely diluted if the ACL morphed into a S14 invitational/franchise type affair. However often Celtic and Rangers represent the Scottish league in Europe, for example, they have to earn that right each domestic season and that energises the whole league. If they were just gifted it through admission to some Euopean 'super league', the entire chain of motivation throughout all tiers of the football system would vanish and the code would just become another closed/insular/franchise-type thing without its unique top-to-bottom community linkage.

Millster, I didn't think you were suggesting that the A League needs to keep its Australian players. A club can put any players on the field from anywhere, my point is more about the dollars needed to keep the better players, the quality players. The salary cap in the world market of futbol makes that difficult with other leagues (Asian or otherwise) on a different player payment system. With a crystal ball, I think the Super 14 style comp in Asia, with 4 big Aussie clubs is inevitable if the FFA wants to keep building domestic soccer. The A League with a salary cap has an artificial ceiling in soccer's sporting universe that includes many other rooms with inter-connected doorways. Redb

Das - thanks for your good points as always but where I dispute the Clive Palmer idea is that it applies only to Socceroos. I would not like to see our league's marquee spots (or other 'concession' spots) unbalanced by returning Socceroos. In fact I am firmly of the view that these Socceroos have to be signed on merit, against other potential marquee options (of course it is possible that they may be willing to sign for cheaper if their intention is to return home to end their careers and to set up their future lifestyles after a period of playing abroad). Perhaps a middle ground is that the exemption should apply to anyone who has played an international for any country. Or if it applies to Socceroos perhaps only to those under 30 years of age.

Pip - I think you have hit the nail on the head. I am not calling for a stopping of the revolving door, nor do I think young Aussies playing overseas is unhealthy (in fact quite the contrary). Part of the strategic review I am calling for probably includes a very close look at the Eredivise, Ligue 1, the Belgian League, and importantly the Turkish league. These are leagues which I think successfully balance the provision of a good product for their domestic audiences and the 'feeding' of the most talented players to the elite clubs in the world. To me its not about stopping the flow, its about finding this balance. And to RedB's related point I am not trying to keep 'the best Australian players' here; my thoughts are not Australo-centric and I frankly don't care what nationality A-League players are as long as the comp, as a product, has some quality and shows some development. Maybe linking these two thoughts together and adding in some innovation around the salary cap leads us to the kinds of places that Jesse Fink regularly blogs about. If we are number 5 or 6 league in Asia, lets make it an aim to lift that to top 3 or 4. And then, just as our 'cream' gets poached, lets make sure that we have a strategy that includes BOTH development of our own youngsters and also an ability for ourselves to poach the 'cream' from the leagues lower than us - perhaps in Indonesia, Thailand, etc. Even based on just last nights match, a few of the Indo's were fire-crackers and if a couple of years in the A-League is a step for them towards Japan or Europe then we will be all the better for it.

I support reforms to salary caps not necessarily to keep our best players from leaving but to prevent destabilisation of clubs that are successful, incentive for returning socceroos and incentives for youth development. Keeping our best player is not going to happen. Our best youngish players will leave after at most 2-3 good seasons. I don't believe in having 3 marquee players as well RedB I do support Palmer's socceroos salary cap exempt. That every socceroo cap in the squad will have a $10000 dollars exemption from the salary cap. This will encourage two things - return of socceroos in australia that doesn't take up marquee positions. Encourage of youth development. If young players get picked up by Pim and play for the socceroos. every time he does that the club gets a few salary cap exemption. Gives incentive for teams to develop players for the socceroos My biggest problem with the salary cap right now is that winning the championship will be a curse for next season as the clubs are decimated. Movement of key players from championship team to other a-league clubs rather then being poach from overseas is the main problem. I agree with Millster that a system where if a player who has played for the club for 2-4 seasons should have a certain percentage of his wage exempted. 50% may be a bit much but the principle is good. This encourages loyalty to the club. Prevents clubs being decimated after a successful season.

Kazama's last two points are pretty good ones. This issue goes well beyond whether we have a cap or not. Towser and others have warned a few times that Asia will end up with 3 or 4 elite leagues to which all the best players gravitate (like Europe). Australia is unlikely to figure amongst those 3 or 4 (the numbers tell the story) - the next best thing is to become the Asian equivalent of Ligue 1 or the Eredivisie (next tier down, but respectable in its own right).

I feel that unless an asteroid wipes out most of Europe the A-League will always be a feeder competition. There simply isn't ever going to be enough money in the game here to buy the world's best players, or even keep our best at home. We are not the only country with this dilemma - in fact we are probably in the majority - and it is something we just have to live with. The way for us to keep the league from declining in quality is to ensure that we always have a large amount of youngsters coming up through the ranks. If the talent pool dries up the A-League will die so we must invest in our kids. If we keep finding good young players like we are at the moment, then we will be OK. Removing or drastically altering the salary cap will only allow the richest clubs to buy all of the best players and dominate every season. As I said yesterday, would we all be happy following a league where Sydney FC and Gold Coast play off for the toilet seat every year, beating the other sides about 5-0 every game? Apart from KB ;-) probably none of us want to see that. The salary cap is there to keep the competition healthy and even, and it's removal would do far more harm than good IMO. Two final points for everyone against the cap to consider: 1) Joel Griffiths isn't under the cap, he's a marquee player and he's leaving, and 2) the K-League has no cap AFAIK, their clubs are more financially stable than ours, and they still can't stop their best players from heading to Japan.

das, Yeah I read it, but I think it is not a curable dilemma for the A League. I think the league is destined for averageness, however certain teams like Melb, Adel, Syd and probably GC would be able to duke it out with the big guys in Asia like Gamba if they did not have the restrictions of a salary cap. There is no such thing as a flexible salary cap, certainly not one that will stand up to scrutiny and has integrity. Open the door, an elephant walks in, the FFA will spend more time fining the clubs for breaches than actually concentrating on the task ahead. Notwithsatnind that comment about flexiblity, the marquee player exception is a good move, but what do have 2 or 3 marquee player exemptions, before you know it the salary cap mechanism is a joke. Redb

good article I agree Firstly that players going overseas is not necessarily a bad thing. I think there's a bit of doom and gloom about that that is not necessary. We are the 6th best league in Asia according to AFC and we have to accept that players will more to leagues above us. Interesting though is the article by Mike Cockerill that it's an option to have a loan deal of players to go play in the Middle East for a lot of money just for the ACL. They can then play in the ACL for Iran, Saudi Arabia or UAE club and then return to the A-league once the ACL group stages are complete. If that is possible this might solve some of our problems. Also agree about the need for the salary cap to be more flexible but not removing it (Redb - did you even read it?) I like the idea of rewarding clubs with salary cap relaxation for regular players (a muscat,thompson, costanzo etc) who have been at the club since A-league inauguration and the returning socceroos.

Millster, This was always going to be a structural weakness of the A League and pretty bleeding obvious - how do you stop the best Australian players from going overseas? If you strip the salary cap, 2 or 3 clubs will dominate and the Central Coast, Nth Qld's will wither on the vine. The A League is not the EPL, you can't allow for a select few clubs to swap the trophies each year. Despite AU's gainful progress, the better funded Asian clubs will more often than not triumph, the average sports going public will lose interest once the novelty wears off. The A League is destined for mediocrity as it is caught in the chasm of player payments here and overseas. The alternative is to strip out the cap, allow Melb Victory, Sydney FC, Gold Coast and maybe Adelaide the freedom to recruit and concentrate on the ACL. Or better still create a super 14 version of the ACL. 4 clubs from Aust, 4 from japan, Korea,etc. Leaving the A League a little NSL like I'm afraid. Perhaps P & R would work in this scenario though. Redb