Rebecca Wilson says A-League to concerned with quick-fix solutions
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/rebecca-wilson-says-a-league-to-concerned-with-quick-fix-solutions/story-e6freyar-1226123146993
WHILE Australia's sycophantic soccer community have heralded the signings of Harry Kewell and Brett Emerton as the end of soccer's woes in this country, nobody has been willing to temper the celebrations with home truths.
Let's be honest. Bringing home two players at the end of their careers is hardly going to provide a long-term injection of health into a haemorrhaging code.
The Football Federation of Australia has become notorious for the quick fix. Instead of building the game from the ground up, every single major initiative from the FFA in the last decade has been top heavy.
Spending $43 million on a catastrophic World Cup bid is a classic example of an administration which goes off half-cocked with the slightest smell of the big kill. The single vote this lot attracted from FIFA is reflective of where Australia really sits in the world order of the game.
The signing of Dwight Yorke to Sydney FC several seasons ago was a classic example of the A-League's quick-hit solutions.
Yorke may have helped to fill the Sydney Football Stadium during his time here, but the moment he departed, the crowds deserted. Nothing was learnt from the Yorke experiment. Instead, Sydney wasted more time and money looking for another ageing star to temporarily fill the coffers.
While most young kids are quitting the sport at the age of 10 or 11, nothing is being done to keep them in the game. Participation rates reach dizzy heights up until the boys hit double digits and then drop off dramatically when the other codes grab them with bigger, school-based competitions and a less elitist structure.
Parents of extremely promising young soccer players are constantly frustrated by selection policies that allow a powerful few clubs to virtually control all aspects of junior development.
While the FFA is happy to see-off our most promising young players to The Netherlands, England and Germany (where they get a rousing reception), they are falling over themselves to throw money at two players who have well and truly seen better days.
Yes, Kewell and Emerton will put bums on seats when Sydney and Melbourne play an A-league match.
The headlines are already bleating about the big game between the two teams which will kick-start the season. But there is no mention of the other teams, the ones that have been losing thousands every week and whose crowd numbers are diabolical.
Nobody has talked about the elephant in the room - the thin spread of player talent across the A-League which has not been addressed. Instead of starting with development, and then thinking about signing a couple of marquee players as a bonus, the obsession has been to throw cash at fading mega-stars.
Melbourne and Sydney engaged in a fight to the death for Kewell's services. We're told the cash on offer is ridiculous, confirmed when Kewell's management started demanding a cut of the gate.
When the Victory signed him for God knows how much money, they were very quick to put their hands out for a concession from the FFA to help pay for their single signing. The idea that the Victory could ask someone else to pay for a player whose price was already way too high, is preposterous.
As loyal a servant as he has been to Australian soccer over many years, Kewell has played very little in recent seasons because of chronic leg injuries. He will be very lucky to make it on to the paddock for a full season with the Victory.
Emerton's signing prompted Sydney FC boss, Dirk Melton, to claim that anybody having a drink in a pub across the weekend would be arguing the toss over which player was the better signing.
Aside from the fact that most of us will be watching league, union or AFL, this bloke is delusional about the state of the game. Australian pub goers will not properly embrace the Australian version of the game until the FFA starts developing, and keeping, its stars here. It is shameful there are no more than a handful of Socceroos who actually played most of their elite soccer in Australia.
The A-League will now become an even more top-heavy affair, with four strong teams and the rest doing their best to stay afloat. Soccer bosses will point at the healthy crowd figures for the Victory and Sydney FC as proof the Emerton and Kewell signings were a masterstroke.
Scratch the surface and the code will still be bleeding, paralysed by an appalling junior set-up, a bunch of bosses hell-bent on hoodwinking the fan base with headline-grabbing signatures, and little else.
