Scott Musgrave
Much has changed since the successes of the World Cup in Germany of 2006. Australia has undergone manager changes, endless speculation as to the successor of Guus Hiddink and the disappointment of the ill fated 2007 Asian Cup campaign.
Now, as the dawn of the first round of World Cup Qualifiers comes there are more and more issues raised about the state of the national side, its coach and the newish venture into the uncharted territory of Asian football.
Previously, as a member of the Oceanic Football Confederation, Australia was a whale in a lake full of plankton. Regularly handing out 10+ goal spankings of small island nations and ultimately culminating in a play-off with another nation. Most recently the qualifiers were conducted against South American opposition in the form of Uruguay, and with the lack of match practice, particularly as a team unit and games against quality opposition, the Socceroos struggled.
There were many issues regarding player releases from their European clubs, and the value of travelling all the way to Australia just to quash a minnow by 5 or more goals. Players of the ilk of Brett Emerton and Scott Chipperfield were always available to play for their nation. However, securing the releases of their higher profile colleagues such as Mark Viduka, Harry Kewell and Tim Cahill was much more difficult.
This problem still has not been solved with the move into the Asian confederation. Many of the qualifiers fall on non-FIFA specified dates, thus the likelihood of release for the of Australia’s star players is greatly decreased. Even recently Sam Allardyce, now sacked as manager of Newcastle United in England, was seen to be encouraging Mark Viduka to throw in the towel on his career with the Socceroos.
Herein lies another issue. Travel from England, or any European country, to Australia is long and tiring for players, particularly when they may need to play for their club only a few days after an international game.
The geographical oddity that is Australia greatly hinders the ability of our Europe based stars to play in the various qualifiers across Asia. The other Asian ‘powers’ have very few players plying their trade overseas and thus can field a strong team every time they play. Iran are perhaps the only other team in Asia that would have a major problem with players because of overseas commitments. Japan for example have only Shunsuke Nakamura as a current international playing overseas at a decent level.
Australia’s best and brightest however have all migrated to Europe. It has been largely theorized that there has been a major talent drain in this country due to a weak professional league. Thus it seems that if our European stars are unavailable we will have to turn to the aged and the youthful to guide us through as they seem to be the only players of note plying their trade in the A-League. The fading stars of Kevin Muscat, Craig Moore and John Aloisi will be heavily relied upon for their experience to steer the young guns of Nathan Burns, Michael Zullo and Stuart Musialik to seemingly unlikely victories against internationally hardened units.
Even the smaller nations of Qatar, Iraq and China (in footballing terms) will cause undue duress to a group of players that can hardly be called a team.
In a recent friendly, Dutchman Pim Verbeek, recently appointed head coach of the Socceroos, pitted a team of A-League based players against the Australian Olympic Squad, also based in Australia. They fell to a 2-1 defeat to the youngsters, although they did have an excuse, they had never played as a team before whereas the Olyroos had been playing together for over a year.
The whole fact of the matter is, if we qualify for the World Cup in South Africa, will we be able to pose any kind of a threat if we don’t have a team that has played together consistently? It’s all well and good to use all A-League based players to get through the qualifying stages, but what happens at the main event? We then call in our Euro-stars only to find they’ve hardly played together? There needs to be some kind of balance struck between A-League players and those based in Europe. We need to have a team that has a Mark Viduka playing alongside a Nathan Burns, a Mark Milligan playing alongside a Lucas Neill. By all means field the best team, not just the best players.
Verbeek has a massive task on his hands if he is to mould and gel a successful team for Asian qualification and success at the World Cup. If we are to call up our Euro players when they are available, what then? And to what end? It seems to be cheating the A-League players who have worked so hard to get to where they want to be.
As I mentioned, a balance needs to be struck between A-League players who play together often and the quality of the European based players. A smattering of both if you will. It’s going to be tough going in any case, to make a working team yet still have the quality to mix with the big boys of International football.
I will nonetheless however look on with interest to see how Mr Verbeek approaches this dilemma as it will surely shape the Socceroos immediate future and determine their ultimate success.
Australia will struggle in Asia, there’s no question about that, one can only pray that a cognitive working unit can be made of enough quality to mix it with the best of the East.
