Sunday, November 12, 2006

 

1999 Vintage

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.

Comments:
Aside from Fozzie's usual motherhood statements and blabberings, I think the overall vibe is correct.

If there is one aspect of the FFA that has worried me ever since they came into being, it is the lack of football qualifications of the decision-makers in assessing football related issues. I like John Boultbee, and he's a wonderful sports logistics expert, but is he qualified to make a (dare I say it) technical analysis of our national coaches?

Near the end of his piece, Foster says: "Buckley will need to quickly ascertain that there has not been, and isn't now, anyone at the FFA qualified to assess and report on the performance of Postecoglou, Arnold, the A-League or Guus Hiddink."

I'm a huge admirer of the FFA, but this is their one true weakness IMO. They need some type of expert to advise the Board on these matters, whether this individual is named "Technical Director", "The Technician" or "Director of Silencing Fozzie" it doesn't worry me. As long as someone can analyse these things properly.

I don't particularly care about the U20s failing to qualify, but once again the manner of our performance was woefully inadequate and at times embarrassing. These tournaments are about developing young players for the senior national team, and I'm afraid that Postecoglou has poisoned these kids with mediocrity.

- TFO
 
...If there is one aspect of the FFA that has worried me ever since they came into being, it is the lack of football qualifications of the decision-makers in assessing football related issues. I like John Boultbee, and he's a wonderful sports logistics expert, but is he qualified to make a (dare I say it) technical analysis of our national coaches?...

I know what you're saying, and IMO this is partly a question of getting ex-players into the administration of the game, something for which few structures exist in Oz AFAIK.

Whatever you think of Boultbee, BTW, he deserves enormous respect for his overseeing of our WC preparations. Finally it was done in a professional manner.

As for the TD issue, again our Well Informed Covite friend put it best: what does he do on a day-to-day basis? It's all very well for Fozzie et al. to clamour that we need one, but what are the actual nuts and bolts of the role?

...I don't particularly care about the U20s failing to qualify, but once again the manner of our performance was woefully inadequate and at times embarrassing....

I only saw brief highlights of the games, but most people who saw all of them seem to agree that it was dull, negative, path-of-least-resistance football for the most part. In which case I tend to agree with Fozzie that Ange should go (partly, as I think I said in another piece, just because he's been in the gig long enough).
 
I love pointing out to youth team failure alarmists how players of certain successful and unsuccessful youth campaigns turned out.

Along with the 1999 u20s and u17s, the 1997 u17s which lost to New Zealand failed to qualify from Oceania (!) had Mark Bresciano and Jason Culina in their ranks.

In the 2005 u17 WC, BTW, I can't remember Nathan Burns looking all that good.
 
I haven't got my own strong opinions about whether or not Postecoglou should be sacked, though I'm watching the discussions here and on James's site with interest.

But I found Foster's interviewing technique on The World Game this afternoon quite disgusting. Right or wrong, he made Postecoglou look good. If that's Foster's standard of sports journalism, he should be sacked.
 
Right on the money Mikey.

There is a big difference between a winning team and developing players, they are independant of each other - just look at pre-seasons and friendlies for examples.

The way to analyse the success of the youth system is not through the results of the youth teams but by the results of the senior team from that youth system.
 
...I found Foster's interviewing technique on The World Game this afternoon quite disgusting. Right or wrong, he made Postecoglou look good. If that's Foster's standard of sports journalism, he should be sacked....

I thought they both came out of it looking like tools TBH. Fozzie has completely lost touch with reality.

...The way to analyse the success of the youth system is not through the results of the youth teams but by the results of the senior team from that youth system....

Thanks Wil...my point exactly.

Incidentally, a senior NT is always going to be a composite of various different youth "cohorts", which makes any serious analysis of the correlation problematic anyway.
 
Good post Mikey. I think most of the salient points have been covered.

The whole going to Britain rather than continent thing, that's an interesting one- something not going to be easily reversed as a trend, mostly for cultural and language reasons one would think. Plenty of Aussies end up in the northern European leagues anyway, right- German, Belgian, Swedish, Danish etc. The one's that go to Italy/Spain seem to hail from a family background from that region, and given those countries strong ties with South American nations and Australia's strong ties with Old Blighty I can't see that one changing in a while.
 
interesting having a look thru the years which players have gone onto become full internationals and which players are playing in their respective state leagues
 
Having just watched the SBS interview with Postecoglou, I was wondering just what Foster's agenda was?

Was it to make Postecoglou look amateurish and a failure?

If it was, he succeeded.

But at the same time, Foster came across (again) as a whining evangelist for 'something' that is never quite fully explained to the general public.

If anybody can tell me, tactically and technically, what that excatly is, I'd be grateful.

Shame that the talk today is of this, and not of Nick Carle or Damien Mori.
 
I thought the row between Foster and Postecoglou on The World Game was incredibly embarrassing for both parties.

Foster seems to have appointed himself to be the man that single handedly teaches all Australian coaches not only to win, but to win by playing breathtaking South American style football> It's impractacle and it is not ever going to happen in Australia.

Foster did not have the balls to even attempt coaching and if I was Ange I would got walked away from the interview, rather than get into a petty fight on National TV.
 
Any nation that discounts the objective litmus test of how well our youngsters perform at youth tournaments does so at their peril.
This misguided mindset that youth football at international tournaments doesn’t matter , seems to me a manifestation of this British cultural cringe, that we inherited.
This British mindset suggests that club football and their apprentice system should be the “be all and end all”, of youth development.
Most enlightened British commentators are coming round to the idea that a more coordinated concerted approach is required.
The fact that the Koreans were technically and tactically superior ( there are those words again), should be setting off alarm bells!
Your complacency is misguided and shortsighted!
De Ball ist Rund
 
...Foster did not have the balls to even attempt coaching and if I was Ange I would got walked away from the interview, rather than get into a petty fight on National TV....

It's incredible how patronising and disresprectful Fozzie is towards coaches in general, isn't it, considering it's a job he's not yet experienced.

...Any nation that discounts the objective litmus test of how well our youngsters perform at youth tournaments does so at their peril.
This misguided mindset that youth football at international tournaments doesn’t matter , seems to me a manifestation of this British cultural cringe, that we inherited.
This British mindset suggests that club football and their apprentice system should be the “be all and end all”, of youth development....

Logic just doesn't come into it when there's knee-jerk Anglophobia to be expressed, is there.

Can you explain to me how you square the above comment about club football and our youth system with the fact that the majority of our Under 20s at the tournament were in academies?
 
Oh dear have, I fallen into the “Anglophobia Chasm”?
I would have thought challenging our adoption of the British approach to youth development in Australia ( emphasising the Physical over the Technical) is the flip side of your questioning the wisdom of Australians chasing football careers in the UK as apposed to the continent.
As for the existing academies in Australia, does anyone really think any academy run by Steve O’Connor et al is a hot house for skill acquisition or merely an extension of our existing flawed culture.
Der Ball ist Rund
 
To try and work out Australia's potential success at senior level from youth team performances is a little ridiculous, especially when qualifiying from Oceania. Only 4 teams from UEFA qualify for World Junior Cup, while 13 qualify for senior WC. Even a second round exit of a junior WC is a gross distortion of progress on the world stage. No Italy, Germany and England usually. Instead you get Yemen and Burkina Faso.
 
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