As Daniel Severino wheeled away from the penalty spot on Boxing Day, having just condemned Brisbane Roar to their fifth straight defeat, I couldn’t help but feel it was an appropriate way to wrap up an eventful year for the game in Australia.
12 months ago the game was still reeling from a shambolic end to Australia’s 2022 World Cup bid, and the reality we’d lost a race we never could have won.
However, the sense of dread that permeated Australian football in the days following the announcement of Qatar’s successful bid proved to be misguided.
The A-League is still here, and while football remains on shaky ground, the end game is yet to have arrived.
In other words, by the end of the year, the change that did occur seemed to end up being replaced by the familiar.
Much like Brisbane Roar’s last 12 months.
Following Monday’s 1-0 loss to Gold Coast United, the darlings of the A-League have dropped to third place, having now gone five games without a win.
Yet while the Roar are far from finished, the legacy of this side will be written in the effect they’ve had on the rest of the competition.
By raising the bar, the rest of the league had to improve.
For once the A-League champions haven’t fallen back into the rest of the pack. Instead, everyone else has caught up with them.
The Roar’s effect on domestic football is something of a microcosm of what has happened to the game at large in 2011 – a year that’s been all about gradual steps.
Three years after it was first conceived, Football Federation Australia finally got around to appointing its Panel of Football Historians. Unfortunately it did so days after it had completely missed the centenary of the local game’s federation.
The A-League made some key changes to the way the fixtures are set up, but failed to address the significant troubles in the competition’s foundations.
FFA rode out the storm of a governmental report into the game’s administration, but questions remain over the peak body’s plans moving forward.
A new online and social media campaign was launched by FFA, but had numerous teething issues.
During the Asian Cup the Socceroos helped to reunite a code splintered by a troubled World Cup campaign, a stuttering domestic competition and the 2022 World Cup bid, though the national side fell just short in the final.
The A-League grand final was another enthralling example of football’s potential in Australia, but it came after one of the worst seasons in the league’s short history.
These are just a few examples of a year in which the game seemed only able to move forward when there were caveats attached.
An asterisk at the end of every positive sentence. A good year, not a great one. A moment of stabalisation and recovery following great loss.
Not quite stuck in place, football took one step sideways for every step forwards.
At least that bloody animated kangaroo was nowhere to be seen and, for now, that will do me.
j binnie
Guest
Tommygun -It's not the crowds that worries the other codes it is the GROWTH of crowds.Someone elsewhere asked why does the HAL "hide" in summer. That statement simply proves that that person has no conception of why that move was made. Put yourself in the hierarchy of football If you have the largest participation sport in Australia that is men& women & kids of both genders and you decided to "sell" a professional league (NSL & HAL) to them would you play that league at the same time as they,those same participants, play???? a man of your intelligence can answer that question, no problem. A thing you may find hard to comprehend is that all over the world in around 200 countries football is played at roughly the same time so that when international competitions are being played,(5 World Cups at the last count, not to mention continental competitions to get to these finals) it is in everyone's interest to be playing at roughly the same time and as the majority of those 200 countries play in the Northern Hemisphere WE had to change. Comprende.???? Now I may have convinced you of better reasons for change so you can see the "fear of growth" should only exist in the imaginations of the AFL or NRL for,with them playing at the same time,they have more to "fear" from each other, no????? jb
Qantas supports Australian Football
Guest
"Should we pretend “Aussie Rules” doesn’t exist as soccer has set up shop as “Australian football”. If you wish Macca call it what you will "Aussie Rules" whatever, but don't come here and tell us we can't call our Football "Australian Football" on OUR Football Tab.
Kasey
Guest
yes, tommygun, please point out where just one football fan has said you mustn't call any other sport BUT the round ball sport football?
Qantas supports Australian Football
Guest
Yer wrong but you can call it what you like just don't tell us what we should call our football on our forum.
Qantas supports Australian Football
Guest
"Its this kind of attitude by association football fans that makes it more difficult than necessary to grow that code in Australia". Ian---that's true but for years on end we were Sheilas Wogs and Poofter who played Sokkah. Johnny Warren's book if you have not read it "Sheilas Wogs and Poofters" tells us of the many years of humiliation of being called all of those names. So here we are in 2011 on a Football Tab and still we have ignoramuses telling us what we should or should not do when we converse to each other on our football forum. There are four types of Australian Football as fare as I'm concerned, but the AFL fans want exclusive ownership. Not on your life.. The late Johnny Warren went to his grave trying to have Sokkah known by its rightful name Football so why should we pretend now that it isn't. So if Macca is so offended by all of this don't read any of the Australian football news on the football tab.. We shall do likewise.
Titus
Guest
EPL, Euro Leagues mainly. Starting to lose players to Japan and Korea also. Seriously TommyGun you have no comprehension of the magnitude of Football. Best stick to your small pond that makes you feel big.
Tommygun
Guest
Couldn't agree more Macca. If soccer were more popular than the other three codes it could call itself The Football League Union! However, it is a distant fourth in popularity and soccer it will remain.
Tommygun
Guest
Reasonable crowds yes, but who are they competing with??? NBL? Any other code would get double those figures if they didn't have AFL, NRL or Super Rugby to compete with.
pete4
Guest
Kasey - winter break idea has been floated for the MLS. My understanding is all domestic leagues will need to come into line with the FIFA calendar sooner rather than later http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Soccer#Criticisms
Kasey
Guest
pete4, MLS will never go to a Euro-synced schedule. That would mean they'd be playing right now yeah? tomorrows forecast high temperature in: Toronto (Toronto FC): -4C Montreal (Montreal Impact):-16C even warm cities like Houston usually have their bad years, this time last year Houston(Home of the Dynamo) had to borrow Snow plows off a northern city because of a freak storm that blanketed the Eastern seaboard and extended down into TX. This time of year is good basketball(NBA) weather. even gridiron has many stadiums with domes! Could you imagine the attendances at MLS going up against the behemoth that is the NFL AND the NBA as well as bad weather. MLS finally got some positive press this year for getting its average attendance above 17k(incidentally above NBA & NHL - of course with fewer home dates so the other sports win on cumulative attendance)
pete4
Guest
Ian - if you turn back the clock the main reason for summer soccer is to align the Australian season with the European season. Not so long ago when we played in winter the top Socceroos would not play or make themselves unavailable pre-international football calendar days. When we were in the middle of our season it was their off-season. The noteable exceptions are to this now are the J-League and MLS both are looking to move their season's now to align themselves with the Euro season to address this issue. Even if we moved back to winter with shared stadiums these days the pitch after an NRL match would make it impossible to have a decent surface for the A-League and hence be a major problem for the game here.
Brendo
Guest
The main reason for the move to summer is media coverage. It is hard enough in summer to get newspapers and TV shows to provide a decent level of coverage let alone in winter when the media is dominated by AFL and NRL
Brendo
Guest
Woo hang on there buddy. I am NOT saying that AFL is not football. What I am saying is that Australian Football is just that Australian Football and shouldn't have to use the word soccer to simply appease some rival code supporters. Why should I have to call the sport I love by another name just because another variant of football uses that name here in Australia. For your information I am one of those people you talk about in your comment. A Richmond and Victory member and I have no problem at all with both codes using the name football. There is no confusion and I have found the only people who ever have a problem with me calling it Australian Football in public are people who are anti-football. You say the use of the term 'football' is alienating a large pool of the fans that could support both codes. I call rubbish on that statement. Whether you call it football or soccer has little or no impact on fan support. A much bigger impact is that way that football is presented in the media as opposed to the other codes. You yourself call it by its offical name Association Football.
Dean
Guest
I would assume to grab more media coverage. It's hard enough to get attention during the Summer but impossible during AFL & NRL finals. Also, there are loyal and devoted fans of AFL & NRL, who are massive football fans. MVFC membership contains a large number AFL members. These people didn't need to be converted to football - they were football fans already.
Ian Whitchurch
Guest
Dean, If what you say is true, why did the HAL move out of the winter, when the other football codes play ?
MelbCro
Guest
ideological purity? hahaha, is this guy for real?
Dean
Guest
Ian Whitchurch, the odd AFL or NRL fan who has nothing to do in Summer is not where HAL clubs need to focus their attention and, thankfully, the penny has dropped. The "We are football" marketing campaign clearly identifies the football family as the HAL's potential target market. If people don't like it - bad luck. In Australia, there is a huge pool of football fans, who support foreign teams but no Australian football team. This is the target market for every HAL club. Such people understand and love the Game and won't complain about the offside rule, diving, lack of goals, etc.
Kasey
Guest
Ian, mate we could go back to exclusively using the term "Soccer". do you honestly think that would change anything? Those that hate our game and wouldn't cross the street to watch a HAL game would just focus on the other garbage reasons they throw up for not liking the game(diving, foreign fans and players, FIFA are corrupt etc). The "oh you arrogant soccer bastards want call it football" is just a flimsy argument. In this country there is no possible way for one code to 'own' football as a term(eg. in the way football means only one thing in America) I find it the height of arrogance from AFL fans to carry on the way they do saying that we futbol fans are trying to "take over the term". To me it suggests in their mind that 'they' already own the term and Futbol is trying to take it off them..now who is the arrogant bunch? Personally I don't care what people call the game I love as long as they are talking about it and perhaps treating it with respect rather than talking down about it.
Ian Whitchurch
Guest
Its this kind of attitude by association football fans that makes it more difficult than necessary to grow that code in Australia. There is a big pool of people out there who could mostly support Manly or Richmond or whoever, but would be more than happy to show up to A-League games. An attitude of 'Your code isnt football' doesnt help recruit these people, but I guess ideological purity is more important than a healthy code for Brendo.
Brendo
Guest
Sorry Macca but it is Australian Football. The only people who get upset by the use of that term are Australian Rules fans who fear that football is trying to take over. You are obviously a strong AFL fan, great but maybe you should worry less about what other people call the sport they love and concetrate on your sport of choice.