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So Brisbane is awash with Asian Champions league fever. Oh, wait, no that’s not quite right.
Following the questionable decision by the AFC to allow the minor premiers of the A-League to be the only team admitted to the group stages of the Asian Champions League (the rights and wrongs of the grand final winners or minor premiers being the champions of Australia is an argument for another time), many would be forgiven for disregarding the continental tournament that had no place for anyone other than the Central Coast Mariners.
Many would be thinking that everyone should knuckle down and get on with the messy business of fighting it out for the premiers plate to try and get to next year’s party.
Only a hardened fan would have realised that despite the revocation of our previous two automatic spots in the groups stages as of last year (a fact which also needs to be rectified on this fine website’s current A-League front page might I add), there was still a chance of doubling our presence in the league stages.
On the day of reckoning for Brisbane Roar (arguably their biggest game of the season following the travails of the past 20 weeks), I find myself wondering how much improved their chance would have been if there had been someone fighting in their corner at any step of the way along the journey that has led to this day.
Having been crowned grand final champions, Brisbane were not allowed direct entry to the group stage, but were dropped into the final qualifying round.
The draw was favourable for the Roar, with the victor taking the spoils, a home game against Thailand cup winner Buriram United.
Up to this point all seemed well. Brisbane were making the best of a poor deal following the AFC moving the goalposts.
However, even back in December, the wheels were starting to wobble on the cart.
The scheduled date for the game was due to be ninth February 2013. A Saturday in the middle of the A-League season. But even back then Brisbane Roar General Manager Sean Dobson said the club was confident a beneficial arrangement would be reached in the near future.
What he failed to say at that time was that they were apparently working on a beneficial solution for Buriram United. In the ensuing weeks, the game has gone from being played on a Saturday in Brisbane to a Wednesday in downtown Buriram.
My congratulations to the Thai outfits negotiators.
I appreciate that Brisbane have not made Suncorp a fortress this season, however, I would have thought that all parties connected with the club and country would have pulled out as many of the stops as possible to ensure another Australian team has as good a chance as possible of furthering the cause of Australian football on an international level.
The NRL All-Stars did mean that there was no chance of the game being played on the allocated day.
However, it would not be realistic to cut out a weekend in the middle of the season anyway so the likelihood of the game going ahead on that day was slim in the first place.
I have checked the events calendar at the Suncorp Stadium and there appears to be nothing preventing the game going ahead on the same day. The West Indies are in town for the T20 international on the same night, I believe, but is this really a significant factor?
There have been past precedents to suggest that two sporting events can co-exist on the same night in Brisbane.
And there is also the fact that out of the two sides, Brisbane are the only one currently playing league matches as the Thai league does not start until next month.
Is there any real excuse as to why there seems to have been a complete lack of a robust defence from any level of the game, be it from the Roar, the FFA or Suncorp Stadium itself to cooperate and try and play the match in Brisbane?
I appreciate that there may be some other valid reasons for the switch, but my limited time and potentially rudimentary ability at using search engines for finding such information has raised no articles giving satisfactory reasons.
The PR for the game has been next to non-existent in the Brisbane area also though you can’t fault the Roar’s consistency following the minimal coverage of their previous tilt at the ACL last year.
The FFA, A-League and the teams themselves need to show some backbone otherwise we will continue to be ridden roughshod over for the foreseeable future.
I wish Central Coast all the very best for their upcoming campaign and good luck to Brisbane Roar in their game today.
It should have been far less complicated.
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