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Football Federation Australia CEO Ben Buckley during the launch of the A-League season in Sydney, Monday, Aug. 2, 2010. (AAP Image/Dean Lewins)
Apart from the possible signing of Harry Kewell, after what can best be described as a comical negotiation process, on-lookers of the A-League can be forgiven for failing to get excited two months away from the new season as positive signs keep failing to emerge.
And positive signs for Australian football fans and potential converts are sorely needed this time round, maybe as much as ever, coming off the back of the last disastrous season of the A-League.
As we all know, it was a season that saw the setting of record-low crowd attendances, clubs ceasing to exist or failing to start, and perhaps the largest amount of negative headlines generated for the fledgling new league since its inception.
Some still seem mystified looking for an answer to the question of “where to next?” for the sport in this country.
But for those of us who have been around the traps of the sport in this country, for longer than most newcomers – at least decades before November 2005 – we know what’s going to happen. History just repeats.
Certain clubs started their austerity programs as early as the second and third seasons of the HAL. Now they’ll all have austerity programs in place – and it is just now starting at the coaching level.
We’ve known for years, decades even, that the great mid-to-low-level Euro coach paradigm is a myth. Clubs like Olympic (nee Panhellenic) and others brought out such coaches in the ’60s and it didn’t work. Some had moderate success, like Pushkas at South Melbourne, more due to bringing in a professional coach in a semi-pro environment.
That won’t work now. Only coaches at the very high level can bring something extra, like a name and respect that can enthuse local players. But they’re not going to come here and short-circuit their coaching careers. Out of sight, out of mind.
The fact of the matter is, the knowledgeable football supporter, who has feasted on a diet of world football coverage from a variety of sources, wants the best. They don’t care to pay money to watch someone they’ve never heard of before, like the Lavickas and van ‘t Schips. They want Hiddinks, Houlliers, Mourinhos, those who have profile.
Understand, Australians are used to watching the best players and coaches, week in, week out, in their chosen sport, be it AFL, NRL or rugby union – on TV or at the ground, a 30 minutes drive away. They’re not going to rock up in their masses, pay good money to watch nobodies. The real deal is on Fox or SBS. You can’t con the knowledgeable spectator, no matter how hard Harper and Hill try.
The way forward is simple: massive cost reductions in pay for all labour capital, especially admin. Cost focused on facilities and promotional spend. Cost matching revenue. I was staggered to read that Melbourne Victory pay $3.1m in administration. A whole club can be run on $3.1m, with change.
Players getting payed $50,000 instead of $140,000 will not cause sponsors like Hyundai to run away. That’s garbage. Paying $50,000 instead of $140,000 won’t increase the “player drain”.
$140,000 is enough to keep the rubbish players happy, but the talented will still leave for the $500,000 in Asia and Europe. All you end up doing is paying $90,000 over the odds for rubbish, which keeps the PFA relevant, happy and rich.
It’s a gravy train, it’s a trough feeding station for all the media pundits, panel beater hacks, corporate administrator hyenas, fake unions and boards to fund their lifestyles so they don’t have to get a real job. That’s all it is.
Cut that fat, cut the cash, and all of them have to go back and get jobs. They’ll do anything for that not to happen, including giving blue-sky projections of a Utopian football society. Money will then go back to grass roots.
In the financial year ’08/09 the FFA spent $93m. It used to be $18m in the pre-Crawford days. Yes, there’s more national team trips to Asia, and prices have increased. But where on earth is the rest going to? Do you know that FFA HQ is now 200 people strong? They’ve created a bureaucracy greater than anything the fruit shop owners ever stole.
So pre-Crawford era Soccer Australia administrators have been accused of many things in the past, such as less than above-board ticket-selling arrangements for national team matches, perhaps pocketing for themselves in the process $20,000 at most. Big deal.
Buckley punts $1.2m into his bank account each year. Boultbee, “Head Of Football Development”, paddles away $800,000. There’s $2m gone, and it’s all above board this time.
Is this a better result for the sport in this country?
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