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Tony Popovic might have been named coach of the season, but Graham Arnold will be the happier man after winning his first A-League grand final.
While there were notable mentions for Alistair Edwards and Mike Mulvey, few other coaches in the competition have been able to keep up with the standard set by Tony Popovic, Graham Arnold and Ange Postecoglou.
It is fitting those three finished at the top of the A-League ladder.
Together, they’ve helped bring about a change in attitudes towards Australian coaches. Indeed, the high turnover of managers this season comes as no surprise.
Club directors are increasingly looking to uncover the next locally-based manager who can take their side to the next level.
It’s been said many times before, but this turn inwards has been a welcome change in the culture of the A-League. It’s been a long time coming, and the beneficiaries of the sea change will understand its significance.
Back in 1993, on the eve of Australia’s World Cup qualifier against Argentina, Graham Arnold spoke to Michael Cockerill about the lack of respect given to Australian players in their own country.
He lamented the lack of career path for retired Socceroos:
“I look at John Kosmina… The guy’s a legend for me… he’s flat out getting a job in the State League. He deserves so much more than what he’s got. One year out of the game, and it’s John who? I think that’s tragic, and he’s not alone.”
Two decades years on, the environment in which Arnold and his peers find themselves in is very different.
Respect for Australian coaches just keeps on growing. No longer are ex-players thrown on the scrap heap.
Instead, ex-players are now being fast tracked into coaching positions.
So much so that many of Arnold’s teammates from his playing days in the Socceroos – including the Vidmar brothers, Gary van Egmond, Alex Tobin, Frank Farina and Mehmet Durakovic – are being joined by a younger wave headed by the likes of Tony Popovic, John Aloisi and Paul Okon.
This is what should have happened from the inception of the A-League, but it’s better late than never.
The domestic competition should be about developing and exporting the next generation of both Australian players and coaches.
Now the trend has taken hold, it looks unlikely to change any time soon. There are even calls for an Australian to take charge of the Socceroos when Osieck finishes his brief.
And with World Cup qualification far from assured, that could be sooner than we expected.
It’s taken a long time for us to be comfortable with an Australian at the helm of the national team. The calls of “Arnold out!” don’t seem too distant in the memory.
But the Guus Hiddink factor has completely faded, while Pim Verbeek’s arrogance and Holger Osieck’s reign of boredom has removed the aura around European coaches.
The question, then, will be which Australian coach should take charge when Osiek moves on. It’s a difficult one to answer, but Popovic, Postecoglou and Arnold are the only clear contenders.
A-League coach of the season Tony Popovic has already received support in many quarters after his remarkable breakthrough season at the Western Sydney Wanderers.
Like Ange Postecoglou before him, there has been a groundswell of affection towards the local boy done good.
Postecoglou’s teams are the most entertaining in the league, but while he’s widely seen as an innovator, he’s far less pragmatic than Popovic and Arnold.
He needs large amounts of time to bring his players up to speed to his very specific style of play, making him far more suited to club football.
But surely it is too soon for Popovic to take the reins of the national team. He has many years of development ahead, and no doubt grand personal ambitions to coach abroad.
Rather than rushing him into the top job, like Soccer Australia did with a young Frank Farina back in 1999, the FFA should give Popovic the space to develop his craft without such enormous pressure.
Like Popovic, Farina was named coach of the season in 1997, after guiding the Brisbane Strikers to the title in his first season as a coach.
A couple of years later Farina became the Socceroos manager, less than five years after his playing retirement from the green and gold.
We now know Farina was a good prospect thrown into the deep end far too early. It may have even been detrimental to his coaching career, as he quickly became a scapegoat for a broader malaise in Australian football.
Indeed, he was hardly operating in the most supportive financial environment.
But while the governing body may have picked up its game, let’s not make the same mistake with Popovic.
Instead, it might be time to reinstate Graham Arnold to guide the Socceroos. He knows the national team set-up as well as anybody, and now has won everything there is to win at domestic level.
More importantly, he’s clearly grown as a coach. Tactically, his team’s set up as well as any in the A-League, but he’s managed it on a smaller budget.
He’s taken the team to Asia, and made the A-League’s smallest club into an on-field powerhouse.
He has helped identify and develop young prospects like Mustafa Amini, Rostyn Griffiths, Mat Ryan, Tom Rogić and Trent Sainsbury. And his man management skills have been a highlight after difficult periods at both Northern Spirit and the Socceroos.
The trouble will be holding onto him. As he said over the weekend, he’s given as much to the local game as he can.
He also admitted he’d take offers if a bigger opportunity came calling.
The question then, is what more do we want? Everybody deserves a second chance, and Graham Arnold has earned his shot at redemption.
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