The Football Tragic

It was inevitable that the early exit of the Australian Under 20 side from the Asian Youth Championship would lead to the gnashing of teeth in certain quarters. Sure enough, Craig Foster has obliged with another piece along familiar lines, droning on about the need for a technical director while damning John O’Neill with faint praise. His use of such a pejorative term as “upheaval” to describe the gains of the past few years is grossly unfair.

But enough of Foster for the moment. In fact, many of us have had enough of him for months.

Let’s just examine the basis for this hand-wringing over a sub-par performance in a junior tournament, in the light of recent history.

The accusations against Ange Postecoglou of negativity, failure to get the most out of his players, etc., reminded me of another Under 20 tournament in which Australia participated.

I remembered, somewhat dimly, watching Australia’s games in the 1999 Under 20 World Cup with some dissatisfaction. The impression that springs to mind is of the Young Socceroos of seven years ago getting outclassed technically by Mexico, and comprehensively outplayed by a fit, motivated Irish side.

Sure enough, on checking the relevant page of the Australian Football Archive (an invaluable resource, this, for anyone interested in Australian football history), my recollections were confirmed. The match reports appended to the games in question have a very familiar ring to them: Australia overly defensive, time for a coaching change, players rotting away on the bench at their clubs, etc.

So who were these underperforming Young Socceroos?

Erm, Mark Bresciano, Vince Grella, Brett Emerton, Mile Sterjovski, Simon Colosimo…

I’ll say it again.

The correlation between success at junior level and success at full senior international level is absolutely minimal.

By way of contrast, the 1999 Joeys, who reached the final of their particular World Cup, only going down to Brazil on penalties, have turned out to be an ordinary bunch indeed.

In terms of our various national teams, the success of our senior international side should be priority number one, with daylight second and third. For obvious reasons.

And once players have reached senior level, their continued development has far, far more to do with their getting regular action, at a decent level of competition, at their clubs. The contribution of national bodies to the continuing development of senior players is negligible, especially if the majority choose to pursue their careers in Europe (as indeed they do).

There have been plenty of young Australians in the recent past whose careers have stalled (or worse) thanks to unfortunate, or unwise, club moves. David Seal, Ned Zelic, Nick Rizzo, and - dare I say it - Craig Foster. We've heard plenty about the need for a technical director; how about an experienced, disinterested expert (a former agent, say), to advise young Australian players on club choice?

It’s worth pointing out here, incidentally, that one of the problems in this area for young Australian players recently has been their automatic choice of British over continental European clubs…often with disastrous results.

I would be the last to deny that the development of young players is crucially important.

But results in junior tournaments?

Of decidedly limited significance, in my view.