Walking down any main street in any inner Melbourne suburb, you’ll find nary a telegraph pole, community centre window, or IGA supermarket that isn’t adorned with a leaflet, complete with pull off tabs, for a local futsal league.
Often multiple flyers are hung adjacent to one another, such is the proliferation of the sport in the Victorian capital.
A simple Google search of ‘Play Futsal Melbourne’ produces a stuffed results page, with a dozen or more different organisations begging for your custom.
Everywhere, social plans are scuppered because of futsalling obligations, and anyone who has played the game knows just how much difference having a substitute makes. Australia is hungry to play futsal.
From the outside looking in, the indoor version of the beautiful game seems a much less demanding variety than its turf-based cousin, but these assumptions usually come from those who haven’t trudged off a school gymnasium somewhere, lungs racked with deathly fatigue, shirt drenched with liquid effort, and ankles throbbing from the soles of portly tackle enthusiasts.
The smaller court means much less distance to cover, but it also offers up its own unique issues; the sticky playing surface and the increased stop-start nature of the play means hell for hips, knees and ankles. In football, a winger whose flank is uninvolved with the play gets a rest of sorts, becomes a thankful, recovering spectator on the far side. No such respite exists in futsal and with only four outfield players plus a goalkeeper, everyone is a striker, everyone is a defender, and as such, all physical responsibilities are largely shared.
In short, it’s a deceptively cardio-heavy experience.
Still, what fun it is, high-scoring, quick, technical and exciting. The less bouncy, smaller ball means there are less cringe-worthy moments of ineptitude when attempting controlling touches, and kick-ins from the sidelines and throw-ins in lieu of goal kicks make for a snappy sporting demeanour.
Tackles from behind are strictly forbidden, as are slide tackles, or any play while on the ground, all designed to dissuade roughness. Impeccable technical skills are rewarded lavishly, as is cohesive team chemistry, so it’s no wonder that the Mecca of the game, as with football, is that nursery of the step-over, the elastico and the roulette, Brazil.
Brazilian boys and girls tend to spend the majority of their formative years on a court somewhere, practising their toe-pokes, their step-overs. The story goes that every footballer in Brazil is firstly trained on a futsal-type court, with a ball similarly suited to honing fine technique, before they graduate, with all the skills now learnt, to football proper.
Brazil is, and has been for a while, the number one ranked futsal nation in the world, followed by the equally tippy-tappy obsessed Spain. You can see the logic in Brazil’s right of passage, and the evidence is compelling. Some of the world’s most technically gifted footballers have credited futsal for moulding them as players.
You need only look at the astounding close control of the Brazil legend Ronaldo to realise how much the tight environment of futsal must have shaped his evolution as a footballer, but he also happens to have said as much as well.
“I needed extremely good feet, because you’re always attempting to beat opponents in the minimum of space. I loved the challenge of playing on such a small pitch,” Ronaldo said of his time on the futsal pitch.
Ronaldinho, Robinho, Neymar, all of them honed their feet on the futsal court. Athletes sometimes even choose to forgo the pursuit of a football career and make one solely playing the indoor game, the most celebrated of which in Brazil is Falcao, a player of such sublime skill, of such audacity and genius, his highlight reel is barely within the bounds of possibility.
Spain, too, can thank futsal for for helping to deliver them a golden generation of staggeringly talented, and tiny, midfield dribble-pixies. Their icon, Xavi, has also spoken of the value of the indoor game:
“In futsal, you see whether a player is really talented. In normal football you don’t necessarily identify talent as easily because it’s so much more physical. But with futsal, you notice the small details in quality, class and tactical understanding.”
The point that the Barcelona captain makes is an interesting one. How indeed could a player the size of a pre-pubescent (or indeed, adult) Lionel Messi hope to survive and progress at youth level only playing the full-size version of the sport? That Messi has such exquisite close control allows him now to not only survive, but dominate an athletic contest despite being much smaller than nearly all of his opponents. Messi is, unsurprisingly, a child of futsal too.
“As a little boy in Argentina, I played futsal on the streets and for my club,” said Messi. “It was tremendous fun, and it really helped me become who I am today.”
This glittering list of footballers and their testimonies make a convincing case that futsal is an essential stepping stone. And the fact that the sport has hop-stepped its way over to Australia can only be a good thing.
The futsal national side, the Futsalroos, made it to the AFF Championship final this month, only to lose to Thailand. Still, Australia, according to the ELO-based rankings system, currently sit inside the top 25 international sides, in 23rd to be precise. Thailand are 17th, for the record.
In a survey performed 10 years ago, indoor soccer was already more highly participated in by Australians 15 years and older than rugby league and rugby union. That number can only have risen in the years since.
Another very welcome figure from a later survey, this time done in 2009, shows that the participation rate in football codes by women is significantly higher in indoor soccer than in Aussie Rules, league or union, on par with touch football and only behind outdoor soccer.
Dissolving the barriers between ‘men’s’ and ‘women’s’ sports is something futsal is at the forefront of, with mixed leagues increasingly popular.
The fact that nations which excel in futsal also happen to excel in football isn’t coincidental. The World Cup-wealthy countries of Brazil, Spain, Italy and Argentina make up four of the world’s top five futsal-playing nations. Australia are ranked 61 places better in futsal than football, but the growth of the indoor game will only help the Socceroos.
Technical proficiency is something for which Australian football has not been traditionally known, with rigorous physicality being more the hallmark of Socceroos teams of the past. But as futsal continues to thrive, so does the likelihood of more and more Australian boys and girls signing up to hone their nimble feet and footballing minds on a futsal court.
With this, an Aussie Neymar, or Xavi, or Messi, maybe smaller than the others but with just as much promise, will be given the nurturing environment to blossom into a champion.
Swampy
Guest
Unfortunately our main issue with Futsal is that it is being played by grown ups. The numbers should be higher for those under 15. We will not produce a Messi if the majority of people playing Futsal are 35! In saying that Futsal should be part of junior development - not all of it. It is more important than ever that kids get outside and breathe the fresh air and experience things like rain and wind and falling over and grass stains. Juniors should play both - indoors and outdoors. While many lambast our Aussie culture of physical superiority you cannot overlook the fact that while Messi & Ronaldo both honed exceptional close quarter skills playing Futsal they are still both physically better than most other footballers. Pretty obvious with CR7 but many people do not realise just how fast Messi is and the exceptional balance he has. He is not just skill. At the highest level you require combinations of every attribute to succeed.
teenage fanlcub
Guest
You've just written my football team match report there! Obviously I'd be man of the match...
Punter
Guest
So did I mate. You see, but I grew up. I now in a week will eat Italian, Japanese, Thai, Indian & Lebanese as well as a BBQ. While I like Midnight Oil, Cold Chisel & ACDC, I also like Springsteen, U2 & like Brazilian music. I also like my theatre, Les Miserables my favourite. It's seeded breads or sourdough for me, white bread would not be in my house. Times changed Johnno, tastes changes. Though one thing I stayed traditional, I still love my cricket, not sure what Kanga cricket is, but I only love Test cricket, this other Big bash stuff just not my scene. Footy to me is Soccer.
Stevo
Roar Rookie
'Brandings' - hahahaha, yeah in the western suburbs of Melbourne in the 70s we called it 'brandy' - same difference same effect. Lovely red marking on the legs, buttocks, etc. A few of us wogs played with the round ball before school in the carpark and during lunchtime. We were a weird mob but geez it was fun.
Johnno
Guest
Punter I grew up in the Australian culture, that was white bread, footy(aussie rules,rugby league/union) and Sokah was Sokah not a footy code, it was seen as an ethnic sport, that they did. And for a laugh you'd have a game of touch footy. Kanga cricket was played more in my school than futsal, which was not even played. Brandings was played more than any football(soccer variety) when i grew up in my version of strayla in the 80's and 90's (white bread,aussie barbeques,blondes,). And when watching SBS, you were either ethnic,or intellectual, that was my strayla back then.
Punter
Guest
Ben, you are in a playful mood today.
Ben of Phnom Penh
Roar Guru
Punter, the key to measuring the comparitive popularity of different sports is to cast about for the statistic that places your chosen sport in its best light and then to declare loudly and with conviction that this particular statistic is the definitive indicator for defining the popularity of any sport. For surfing I'd go for "number of youtube clips set to cool music", for walking perhaps "number of dog turds trodden in".
Punter
Guest
How do you measure spectator sports, I watch the surfers everyday on my walk around Manly beach & what about the walkers, many people on the park bench watching me walk. Some people!!!!!
Punter
Guest
Johnno reckons that's not real!!!
Fussball ist unser leben
Roar Guru
The top 10 activities: Participation data published by the ABS in 2012 for Aussies aged 15 years and older: (Figures in 000s) Walking for exercise = 4,258.8 Fitness/Gym = 3,089.3 Swimming/Diving = 1,401.0 Cycling/BMXing = 1,366.1 Jogging/Running =1,360.7 Golf = 860.5 Tennis (indoor and outdoor) = 750.3 Soccer (outdoor) = 489.1 Netball (indoor and outdoor) = 450.2 Bush walking = 436.5
Fussball ist unser leben
Roar Guru
1. The futsal figures do NOT include outdoor football participation. It's a separate category in the ABS analsyis. 2. The ABS data includes 68 activities, including: walking, yoga, pilates ... but, alas, no category for "touch" or "oztag". You may want to contact the ABS and get them to include those activities in the next data collection.
Kevin dustby
Guest
No response fuss? And how do they compare to fishing, cycling and jogging?
Paul
Guest
The only way I will even give a toss about the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast will be if futsal is added to the program. The home nations of the UK could actually compete as they naturally would and the African nations would add a lot of flavour, not to mention the likes of Malaysia, the Carribean nations and of course NZ.
Paul
Guest
I think the name was "Ginga"
bilbo
Guest
So your figures for Rugby League include touch and oztag?
AZ_RBB
Guest
Some pretty awesome footage of a recent futsal match between Brazil and Argentina, played in front of a crowd over 50k http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qu-Gpa9VqAo
Simon Smale
Roar Guru
Great article Evan, really interesting. I used to coach youth football in the UK and I often bemoaned the fact that the kids played on full sized pitches and developed more skills in punting the ball down field as opposed to close control and skill. Most of the drills we used to do were on tight, small pitches. Futsal was simply not popular in England. The fact that it's getting more popular over here is yet another positive step for Australian football.
Ben of Phnom Penh
Roar Guru
You probably do know some futsal players, Johnno, as it fits very neatly into the "afterwork" lifestyle. It's a bit like touch, a great "afterwork" activity that people derive far more from participating in than they do from watching or discussing.
The Minister
Guest
"entered my culture" :D Always good for a laugh Johnno. Is this your mother tongue Johnno? A lot of people speak 2 or more languages in Australia. I don't think you even speak one. I played futsal for a period of time but feel a lesser person for not having entered your culture and lifestyle.
HardcorePrawn
Roar Guru
A group of us from work set up a futsal team a few years back. To say we were poor is an understatement. We finished every one of our 5 or so seasons with the wooden spoon, and regularly lost by cricket scores to teams of fleet-footed kids with astounding ball control. Our average age meant that we were the oldest team in the league by over a decade, and although I've never been a decent player, and my best years (what there were of them) are long behind me, it's no boast to say that I was easily one of our team's two best players. We had some lads who'd never kicked a round ball in their lives and who would regularly swing at thin air in a failed attempt to make contact with the ball. Our least coordinated player put his hand up to play in goal, and so enjoyed it (for some reason) that he remained in that position for years. This despite employing a goal-keeping technique that involved shutting his eyes and using his hands to cover his face and wedding tackle whenever a shot was sent his way. We often had to play with a man down after one of our number left the court to throw up, and on numerous occasions had to fend off rival teams from poaching our one decent player. Still, it made for some great laughs, and got us all a little fitter. It was only thanks to the company downsizing that we eventually had to call it a day.