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Soceroos captain Lucas Neill expresses bemusement. AAP Image/Julian Smith
Last week in a column for The World Game, I criticised Lucas Neill for appearing to have chosen Turkish Süper Lig club Galatasaray over his current employers, English Premier League club West Ham.
As it stands currently, Neill is playing for no one, having not signed with Gala and not accepted a new “extension” with West Ham.
I copped a bit for having a go at “Luca$h” for flirting with a lesser league just a year out from the World Cup, with some readers bringing up the case of Jason Culina as another example of a current Socceroo dropping down a few career pegs for financial/lifestyle considerations. Isn’t he potentially letting down the Socceroos cause as much as Neill?
The point is a valid one but I think there is a difference.
First, let me say I don’t necessarily support Culina coming back to the A-League, a view shared by the Australia coach Pim Verbeek. It is up to Culina himself to prove he has what it takes to maintain the sharpness and professionalism that has made him one of the first names inked on Verbeek’s first XI teamsheet.
He will be up against it and no matter how much the midfielder says his standards won’t drop, the A-League is clearly a step down from the Eredivisie. (The same pressure will apply to Mile Sterjovski, Jacob Burns and Chris Coyne, Perth Glory’s new triumvirate of signings.)
So how, then, is Neill a unique case?
Essentially, Neill is our captain. Culina is not.
Neill commands a massive leadership role both officially and unofficially, on the pitch and off it. He is the player all the younger players within the team by definition must look up to and his contemporaries – Kewell, Cahill, Schwarzer, et al – must respect.
Kewell and Neill are old friends and if Neill joins “H” at Gala there are obviously going to be no issues of disrespect. But Schwarzer has already cast his own doubts on the merits of Culina’s move to the A-League and the same doubts should apply to any prospective move by Neill to the Süper Lig.
If Neill goes to Turkey, Cahill and Schwarzer will be our only top-line Socceroos playing first XI football week-in week-out in the EPL, with Blackburn pair Vince Grella (far from first XI) and Brett Emerton (coming back from injury) and Hull’s sparingly used Richard Garcia the only other players getting around in the comp.
Is that really the most ideal scenario for Australia 12 months out from South Africa 2010?
The Socceroos need a captain who is playing at the highest level available to him and I don’t care what anyone says – the EPL is a better league than the Süper Lig.
What better preparation for our most important defender than having the world’s most dangerous players – Torres, Drogba, Van Persie, Rooney, et al – bearing down on you every week?
And the suggestion that because Gala is playing in the Europa League (the old UEFA Cup) it makes it a better option for Neill than West Ham is just a crock. Gala’s first game on July 16 is against FC Tobol Kostanay of … wait for it … Kazakhstan.
How is that going to be a real test for our national captain?
As a Socceroos fan, I’d like Neill to stay in the EPL where, on reduced terms or not, he has an opportunity to play his tenth season in arguably the best league in Europe and play yet another as captain.
Is Galatasaray offering Neill the captaincy? No? Then how can it be beneficial to the Socceroos?
No matter how many ways you look at it, for the sake of our World Cup ambitions, Neill has to stay to England.
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