The last four A-League titles have all been won by homegrown coaches, so is Western Sydney’s habit of signing big names on the basis of overseas experience costing them where it counts?
Andy Keogh’s second goal was the talk of the town in Perth Glory’s 5-1 thrashing of the Wanderers on Sunday night, with the Irish striker bagging four after previously going scoreless for the entire season.
Keogh lobbed Wanderers keeper Daniel Margush from 40 yards to nab his second before halftime, with the veteran grabbing two more after the break to celebrate his birthday in style.
Glory looked up for it from the get-go at HBF Park, and the difference between the two teams was perhaps best illustrated by the opening goal.
Not many opponents would let Diego Castro stroll forward in acres of space, yet the Spaniard had all the time in the world to pick a pass for Kosuke Ota. And despite the Japanese fullback being one of the most accurate crossers in the A-League, Tate Russell didn’t exactly hurtle towards Ota in an attempt to shut him down.
Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, then, that once Ota crossed the ball it was Keogh who ghosted in between Patrick Ziegler and Mark Natta to head home the opener.
Five minutes in and the Wanderers were already a goal behind. It was the ninth time this season they’ve conceded inside the opening 20 minutes.
That’s surely worth scrutinising for a slightly left-field reason, namely that Carl Robinson is one of the best talkers in the A-League.
By that I don’t mean Robinson is a great communicator – although I personally think he is. You can tell he has years of media experience every time he does a piece to camera.
What I mean is that whenever things go wrong for the Wanderers, as they’ve done frequently this season, Robinson has a habit of speaking very forcefully and directly about those problems.
What’s he saying when he does so? The usual platitudes.
But the impression one gets after Robinson has finished talking is that he’s a coach with presence and gravitas and a force of personality that’s strong enough to inspire confidence.
(Photo by Ira L. Black/Corbis via Getty Images)
And I just wonder if Western Sydney’s football department hasn’t signed at least a few of their coaches on the ability to talk a good game.
You could argue the club tried to go back to their roots by appointing Jean-Paul de Marigny in 2020, but his hard-nosed approach lasted only 12 matches.
But in Josep Gombau and particularly Markus Babbel, Western Sydney handed over the reins to coaches as quick with a soundbite as they were at finding solutions on the pitch.
That’s not to denigrate foreign coaches on the basis of their passport. The last one to win a championship was Guillermo Amor, who ironically downed Tony Popovic and his Wanderers side to win the 2016 decider.
But when the next three A-League coaches to claim the title have been Graham Arnold, Kevin Muscat and Steve Corica, it’s hard not to wonder if recruiting coaches predominately on the basis of CVs polished overseas isn’t costing the Wanderers in the short term.
Currently the top six positions are all filled by homegrown coaches, although Melbourne City obviously improved out of sight under Frenchman Erick Mombaerts last season.
And it could equally be argued that Melbourne Victory and the Newcastle Jets have struggled all season under the likes of the recently axed Grant Brebner and Craig Deans, two coaches who know the A-League intimately.
Robinson of course still has time to turn things around and could even be crowned champion at the end of the finals series.
It’s hard to see that happening on the basis of Sunday night’s performance though.
The Wanderers thought they’d pulled off a coup by landing Robinson from the Jets at the start of the season, and so did I.
He talks a good game. But Wanderers fans are entitled to wonder when the team’s actions will start speaking louder than Robinson’s words.
Dan
Guest
The team has to many average older players just collecting a pay check. Once the club remove Mutch, Dorrens, Troisi, Ziegler & Muller from the club and actually use the players developing in the Academy we will see how good a coach/manager Robinson actually is. The standard of football the prior mentioned players have produced this season has seen me being not bothered to watch the games live either in person or via tv anymore.
Silvio Arratia
Guest
Mike - A coach managerial success always will be related to the quality of the players he has , in Carl Robinson case he may have done well with the Jets but he had a well running partnership in defense and willing youth to go forward, at WSW he has an ageing defense who does not have the speed to adjust quickly and more often than not get caught up floundering early on the matches and is hard to win games like that. I guess by the end of this season somebody has to pay for this failed campaign and being already several campaigns without success maybe the fault should be found on the front office more than the coach . Truth to be said WSW have an outstanding training ground ,an academy that is starting to bring good players but wining is what brings bums on seats only die hard supporters keep coming back for more pain.
Roberto Bettega
Roar Rookie
Sorry, I was wrong. A-League Hub has confirmed on Twitter that the $20+ mill bid from Ten does indeed include both FTA and streaming (of course it excludes socceroos/matildas). Nine/Stan still in the picture. Fox is probably still sniffing around if the prices stays that low (Foxtel paid around $32 mill for current season).
The Rev. Pat Brodnik 2.0
Guest
Carl Robinson isn't a good coach, but it by no means gives credence to any theory about homegrown coaches being generally 'better'????
scouser4life
Roar Rookie
Gombau was a top notch coach. Probably too good for WSW.
coolncold
Roar Rookie
You must be a good WSW fan because you are thinking of WSW reaching top 2, not into top 6. Is that too optimistic?
Winter A League is Awesome
Guest
That sounds like a great netflix or paramount special to watch.
chris
Guest
Good point Marcel and one quite often overlooked. I think there should also be concessions (maybe there is?) for playing young players, say under 23, that have come through the academy.
Punter
Roar Rookie
You were quoting a $1million from your SBS source. So no mates, no idea.
Rodger King
Roar Rookie
I think they were referring to the US market. EUFA haven't announced who has the Australian rights.
Nick Symonds
Guest
Just looking at the league table, the Wanderers are 7th with 31 points which is just 5 behind Central Coast on 36 points in 2nd. If the Wanderers had just two more wins they'd be ahead. Another thing, the last two teams are Victory placed 11th with 15 points and the Newcastle Jets who are last placed with 14. But Victory have a goal difference of -31 compared to the Jets with -16. The only other team with a negative goal difference is Western United with -6. There's only a 6 goal goal-difference between Sydney FC and Wanderers. GOAL DIFFERENCE Melbourne City +28 Sydney FC +8 Brisbane Roar +7 Central Coast +4 Wellington Phoenix +3 Western Sydney +2 Adelaide United +1 Macarthur and Perth =0 Western United -6 Newcastle Jets -16 Melbourne Victory -31
NoMates
Roar Rookie
LOL $20m a season is just speculation and if true just shows you how far the A-League has sunk in terms of value. $20m to be shared between theA-League/ W-League and NYL which basically puts the AL @ around $10m a season to be shared between 12 clubs lmao. Just goes to show Rugby is doing things right.
Hudddo
Roar Rookie
He's just getting started. Hahaha
Roberto Bettega
Roar Rookie
I assumed the Ten offer is FTA only. The streaming rights would be additional.
Marcel
Guest
In SFC's case, Loyalty Player concessions...the upside of an ageing squad.
Punter
Roar Rookie
Sorry for the confusion in my interpretation.
Punter
Roar Rookie
Cannot agree more Chris. I actually wanted Optus, but Paramount has channel 10. But then I haven't watched channel 7, 9 or 10 in over a year. Even SBS & ABC not that much.
Nick Symonds
Guest
ADVERTISING REVENUE Network 10 earned $141 million in advertising revenue in the first three months of this year, up from $113.3 million over the same time the previous year, up $28 million. Seven West Media made $192 million over three months up from $186.6 million last year. Nine Entertainment Co made about $232 million – almost the same amount as last year. It makes up 41 per cent of total revenue for the sector. - OTHER NEWS New global TV giant? AT&T preparing to merge media assets with Discovery Through its WarnerMedia unit, AT&T owns CNN, HBO, Cartoon Network, TBS, TNT and the Warner Bros. studio. Discovery, backed by cable mogul John Malone, controls networks such as HGTV, Food Network, TLC and Animal Planet. The deal could give the combined company enough programming to compete with Netflix and other streaming services. - https://www.mediaweek.com.au/roundup-abc-board-my-kitchen-rules-kurt-fearnley-more/
Stevo
Roar Rookie
Yes, Paddy is simply the current manager who has been instructed to continue with the Man City/Pep style of play. Erik Mombaerts came in after the havoc created by Warren Joyce and he successfully righted the listing ship that was Melb City back to the Pep style. You can in fact go back to the founding of Heart to see that the current style is in a way connected to Cruyyf via John Van ’t Schip. Schip was brought in by John Didulica, as director of football at Heart, to implement a Dutch style of football at the club. Schip and Cruyyf were friends. Cruyyf started the Barca revolution and Pep, in time, followed. Pep now at Man City, and Melb City owned by CFG and the loop is completed.
chris
Guest
Punter, Channel 10 and Paramount + would be a very good outcome. If any FTA was to be involved I'm happy its 10, which has a much younger demographic than dinosaur platforms & and 9. Fox can poq as they have shown nothing but contempt for football over the past few years. And please do NOT allow 7 & 9 anywhere near the women's WC.