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Newcastle Jets coach Gary Van Egmond (centre) celebrates with his players after the Melbourne Victory v Newcastle Jets A League game at the Telstradome in Mellbourne, Sunday, Nov. 26, 2006. Newcastle won the game 1-0. AAP Image/Martin Philbey
To be fair to Con Constantine, the great ogre of Australian club football, he does make a good point about the propriety or lack thereof in Football Federation Australia’s role in poaching Gary van Egmond from the Jets to the AIS and the national under-17s.
“This has hurt me, the club, the players and the fans,” he told Ray Gatt on Tuesday. “The worst thing is that FFA is supposed to be the policeman of the game, but they are not doing their job properly. This wouldn’t happen anywhere else in the world. I am a businessman and I would never dream of conducting my business this way. If the FFA want to fine me, well, it would be like fining Jesus Christ because of the treachery of Judas.”
A good line, and bang on the money.
How can the FFA, an organisation that tosses out fines and suspensions like a bag lady feeding pigeons, effectively “tap up” one of the coaches of a competition it runs without seeking permission from the club’s owner first and without so much as a hint of self-restraint or self-censure?
It is pretty shameless. But who’s policing the police?
Technically you would imagine the AFC or FIFA would be the cop for such matters, but historically both have shown scant interest in getting involved in neighbourhood scuffles, leaving them to be sorted out by the national federations involved.
It serves a president’s political interests of course, to keep as many federations as he can onside. Mohamed, Frank and Sepp are certainly pally enough. How could Con hope to get anyone’s ear among all the backslapping?
No chance. But he was right to speak up and give the FFA a piece of his mind.
They can be a law unto themselves, clearly.
As for Van Egmond himself, one can hardly blame him for wanting out when such a better off was made and after what has been such an annus horribilis at a clearly dysfunctional club, but he did sign a four-year contract of his own volition, Constantine did give him a break when he was “selling Pepsi” and he did have a duty of care to his players, whom he has more or less abandoned just a month out from the start of the season.
He doesn’t come out of this with his reputation enhanced.
It’s quite an irony, too, for Van Egmond to entrusted with such responsibility over our country’s best young players when he has such a chequered record handling young players at the Jets.
As a shrewd blogger named Krones remarked on my Half-Time Orange column for TWG on Monday: “How could he possibly be considered for this position after his comments about the young player [Jesse Pinto] he played for 5min last year and tore off the pitch and his treatment of Kaz [Patafta]? Hardly the sort of thing you would expect from a development coach. Short memory the FFA have.”
I completely agree. I thought Van Egmond’s hooking of Pinto earlier this year after just coming on against Adelaide was one of the worst examples of coaching I’ve ever seen.
We can only hope Dutchy recognises his own mistakes, personal and professional, and can pass on those lessons to his charges so they can be both better people and footballers.
Everyone is entitled to make a mistake. It appears Dutchy’s quota, though, was filled some time ago.
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