tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall/5 2009-09-11T22:37:57Z Matthew Hall has reported from three World Cups and watched Australians play football in Zagreb, Madrid, Milan, Montevideo, and Wigan. He once drove around Bondi in a Hyundai Excel with Harry Kewell. Movable Type 3.36 tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.876 2009-09-11T22:32:33Z 2009-09-11T22:37:57Z

In the week's least surprising news (ever), England are now destined to win the World Cup....

Matthew Hall In the week's least surprising news (ever), England are now destined to win the World Cup. Diego Maradona's Argentina. That's Diego Maradona's Argentina with Lionel Messi, Javier Mascherano, and Carlos Tevez. Losing to Brazil - at home! - last weekend was bad but a 1-0 loss to Paraguay in Asuncion midweek was worse. Argentina now stand fifth in COMNEBOL's World Cup qualification table and are in direct competition with our old pals Uruguay, seemingly World Cup play-off addicts, for the final place. Maradona, who martyred himself by taking on the poisoned position of national team coach, is now facing a crisis of confidence and cacophony of criticism at home. God is apparently not what he used to be but Argentina has been in this position before, however. In 1993, they were forced into continental play-offs - with Australia. Then, Maradona made a comeback as a player to successfully steer his ship to USA '94. Now, as a coach, things aren't working out so much. As a fan said after last weekend's loss to Brazil. "Even if we win the Cup, it doesn't confirm that Maradona is a great coach," said one Argentine fan after last weekend's loss to Brazil. "It would just confirm that Maradona is God." ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.871 2009-09-04T21:08:13Z 2009-09-04T21:37:59Z

"All I know most surely about morality and obligations, I owe to football."...

Matthew Hall "All I know most surely about morality and obligations, I owe to football." The Plague and for being a somewhat reasonable goalkeeper with his university football team. Camus never claimed that life always took the high moral ground - far from it. I once referenced that famous Camus quote on a business card - part pretension and part advisory to some of the people who once inhabited the dark world of Australian football. That business card always got second looks. However, some strange events have occurred in the past months that have cynics like me scratching their heads. Things kicked off in July with A-League officials taking an initiative, of sorts. The Australian domestic comp followed the lead of the Scottish Premier League (see, not everything that comes from Scottish football is bad) introducing retrospective bans on players found to have deceived the referee, ie "divers". That is, players who cheat. Hooray for that. Diving again hit the headlines just over a week ago when Arsenal striker Eduardo, a Brazilian who plays international football for Croatia, took a dive in a UEFA Champions League game against Scottish side Celtic. Arsenal were awarded a penalty from which Eduardo scored and killed off any ambition Celtic had of getting back into the game. Pretty much everyone regarded Eduardo's tumble as Hollywood quality acting. Everyone, that is, except for the referee, Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger, and die-hard Arse fans. But perhaps more shocking than Eduardo's act of deception was that UEFA, the governing body for football in Europe, decided to take action and impose a two-match suspension on the player. This provoked outrage from Arsenal (and the team's fans), the club responding with a 19-page dossier in Eduardo's defence. Perhaps it was printed using a large font. But, so far, the ban stands (unlike the player). On cue, Arsenal met Manchester United last weekend and Wayne Rooney "won" a penalty that put United back in the game. Arsenal fans say Rooney dived, Rooney said he didn't and doesn't so, cough, case closed. The moral high ground rose a few metres even higher when Chelsea was banned by FIFA from signing any players until 2011 after the club was found guilty of "illegally inducing a French youth international to sign in 2007". That sounds like baby births gone bad but FIFA isn't joking about Chelsea's controversial acquisition of Gaël Kakuta from the youth academy of French club Lens. To make its point. FIFA also banned Kakuta for four months and fined him €780,000, somewhere close to AUD$1 million. Chelsea plans to appeal, of course, suggesting in a statement "the sanctions are without precedent to this level". That's true and exactly the point. "They stole the boy off us when he was 16," Gervais Martel, President of Lens, told The Guardian. "He was at our club since the age of eight-and-a-half. Unfortunately, 95 times out of 100, it's the English clubs who come and help themselves." Morality and obligations? Perhaps, slowly, professional football is being dragged up those hills. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.867 2009-08-28T16:19:23Z 2009-08-28T16:25:53Z

Outrage swept across England earlier this year at the prospect of Rome hosting the final of the UEFA Champions League Final....

Matthew Hall Outrage swept across England earlier this year at the prospect of Rome hosting the final of the UEFA Champions League Final. The Times, the newspaper outraged by the potential threat to the safety of traveling football supporters. The Times, bless its concern, organised a campaign that included a petition and open letters to civic and football officials to have the Final moved from Rome. In its own words: How many people have to be stabbed in Rome before UEFA agrees to move the Champions League final? Roma's notorious supporters are stuck in the dark ages of the Seventies and Eighties, but that has not stopped Uefa from pressing ahead with its controversial plan to hold this year's Champions League final in Rome's Olympic Stadium. The time is right to make a stand. Oops. Last Tuesday, in London, gangs aligned to West Ham United Football Club and Millwall Football Club fought and rioted around West Ham's stadium. West Ham hooligans stabbed an 'innocent' Millwall supporter and later during the game, mounted a pitch invasion that at times looked more like a Save The Whale rally than a football match. I'm no expert on hooliganism but have experienced mob violence in several different guises close up and first hand in many countries across the world (I get paid for this). In Scotland, I've watched young Protestants and Catholics, supporters of rival teams, fight in the streets over something or other that happened (off the pitch) hundreds of years ago. In England, I've seen Chelsea fans attack a man watching a game with his grandson in their stadium because the 10-year-old kid wore a scarf of their opponents that day. In France, during the 1998 FIFA World Cup, I watched England fans fight locals in the streets of St Etienne after their national team was eliminated from the competition. That led to an invitation from British police (who had a special unit dedicated to the problem and present in France observing hooligan activity) to travel to Luxembourg and see their anti-hooligan efforts on an England away trip. (On that journey, English fans without tickets tried to storm the stadium, failed, subsequently rioted, and smashed up the city centre instead; there were just 16 or so arrests). That led to meeting one of England's most notorious hooligans of the 1990s and his "crew", a gang from Carlisle near the Scottish border, who politely asked if they could stay on my couch in London during a weekend of planned mayhem (request declined but I did buy one of them a pint). In Australia, I've watched teenagers from the western suburbs of Sydney fight each other and them met later to enquire about their motivation. In every case, football matches and teams were not the reason for violence. The tribal aspects of following a team - we are the same but different to you - supplied a platform to unleash the inner - and not so inner - beasts. It is no secret that tournament organisers breathed a sigh of relief when England failed to qualify for Euro 2008, hosted by Austria and Switzerland last year. No England? The violence there was left to hooligans from Poland and Germany. But the Football Association (English football's governing body) and the British government will be nervous about the amazing scenes, especially with the 2012 Olympic Games in London and the bid for England to host the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The Times has not yet started it's campaign to stop either event taking place in London, the scene of last week's violence but, on its previous form, it can't be too long, surely? For England's World Cup hosting rivals (of which Australia is one) you can be sure that, behind closed doors, the army of yobs might be the greatest thing to happen for their own respective bids. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.864 2009-08-21T16:41:20Z 2009-08-21T16:50:22Z

Members of Australia's "bid team", some of the people working to bring the FIFA World Cup to Australian shores in 2018 or 2022, fly to Switzerland this weekend....

Matthew Hall Members of Australia's "bid team", some of the people working to bring the FIFA World Cup to Australian shores in 2018 or 2022, fly to Switzerland this weekend. You can check the cast of characters here. The trip is not for any formal lobbying - although there may be a few diplomatic cocktails at FIFA President Sepp Blatter's favourite hotel bar in Zurich. This junket is a compulsory "workshop" held for delegations from all bidding nations. On the agenda: FIFA will brief candidates on "legal requirements, media and communications, marketing and television, host city requirements, and corporate social responsibility". But the event is a simple coffee break as Football Federation Australia spends the $45 million of funding it received from the Australian government for it's bid. Some of that public money (ie, it's yours) is already on its way out of Australia, now allocated to international "consultants", attempting to advise FFA Chairman Frank Lowy on how to counter the ever-more impressive bid building from the United States. When it comes to the US bid, Australia is struggling to compete. Last week, the US Bid Committee announced a shortlist of 27 cities that will be further considered to host World Cup matches. These include Dallas (a stadium with 100,000 capacity), Detroit (108,000 capacity), Los Angeles (92,000) and Phoenix (71,000). Some of those cities even have two stadiums capable of hosting matches. Earlier this month, it was announced Phillip Anschutz, American soccer's sugar daddy, had joined Arnold Schwarzenegger and Henry Kissinger the US bid committee. Anschutz is one of the biggest players in the world of entertainment. He's the grandfather of Major League Soccer having owned seven teams over its 13-year history. He was the guy who brought David Beckham to America and his company, AEG, owns stadiums and venues all over the world. While the Australian city of Adelaide still needs convincing to build a stadium suitable to host a World Cup match, Anschutz has a couple in his backyard he could probably lend South Australians. Meanwhile, President Obama continues to get in on the game. Last week, he wrote to FIFA President Sepp Blatter, thanking the governing body boss for dropping by The White House last month, as you do. "I very much enjoyed our conversation about football, sport and the importance of education," Obama chirped. "I must congratulate your on your determination to break down social barriers, promote tolerance and encourage harmony between people around the world by spreading a message of hope by means of football." Of course, in the world of backroom deals and FIFA Executive Committee politics, none of these frilly stadium lists and letters from Presidents may matter when it comes to vote crunch time. That, at least, is what Lowy is hoping his expensive team of newly-appointed international consultants is about to tell him. Advice is free, you see. Especially when it's government-funded and someone else is paying for it. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.860 2009-08-14T15:30:01Z 2009-08-14T16:18:48Z

Right minded people - and there must be a few of you out there, surely - will prefer Manchester City be relegated from the Premier League this season....

Matthew Hall Right minded people - and there must be a few of you out there, surely - will prefer Manchester City be relegated from the Premier League this season. Ouch. City, you see, were always something of a non-event. They were a club that was likely to never win much, nor lose much. They just were unless you're a Manchester United supporter and looked forward to the twice-yearly local derbies. Ten years ago, the club was in the Third Division (currently known as League One - because it's actually League Three, get it? Me neither) with no hot water in the dressing room showers. That's fine, unless you're a City fan, but then along came the government of Abu Dhabi (effectively a family) with Sheik Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan riding in from the desert wearing a blue scarf. City, whose fans boast of being the only team geographically in Manchester, were now owned by a rich family from the Middle East. A very rich family from the Middle East. A family so rich that the club can not only now afford to buy the contracts of some of the world's best players but also pay those players unspeakably high wages, thus luring those players away from the more usual practice of signing with other clubs more likely to have success. But this Abu Dhabi mob may be on to something. They have taken one look at the Premier League, and the success Chelsea has experienced since sugar daddy Roman Abramovich became involved with the club, and decided the only way to beat them is to join them. Forget a well-meaning policy of developing youth players over a decade (or even five years if you're Arsenal's Arsene Wenger). Splash the cash. Spend it and success will come. So City went and acquired five centre-forwards (Roque Santa Cruz, Craig Bellamy, Carlos Tevez, Emmanuel Adebayor and Benjani Mwaruwari), spending around $300 million on transfers during the off-season in total. And here's the tricky part. The Premier League is often billed as the "world's most exciting league" or some such rubbish but that's not true. In the past decade only four teams have effectively challenged for the title and only three of those have actually won. This is the famous "top four": Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Arsenal. It's impossible, and players I have spoken with agree, to break into that elite group. Exciting? Definitely predictable. Then City perhaps make it interesting, assembling a talented team but one that is motivated solely by money. To use the awful language of MBA graduates, this is an interesting "project". For the neutrals, unlike City fans, we maybe get a win-win situation. If City fails, we will watch a spectacular and expensive car crash. If City succeed, the Top Four will be broken and this really will be a season more exciting than most. But the moral compromise will be that money can buy success. But probably not love. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.857 2009-08-07T15:11:58Z 2009-08-07T15:23:12Z

Quotes, chaos, drama, soap, egos, idiots, and entertainment....

Matthew Hall Quotes, chaos, drama, soap, egos, idiots, and entertainment. professional (key word) level must hold an "A Licence" by 2010 if they want to participate in AFC competitions. FFA has said all A-League coaches must possess the same badge by 2011. It is a similar situation facing Branko Culina, the Newcastle Jets coach. "I don't really care about what FFA want or requires," Bleiberg said. "If I feel like taking the course I will, if I don't feel like it, I won't. Nobody is going to force me." Unless of course, you want to be part of something bigger, as the marketing slogan goes. It's going to be a long year but obviously an entertaining one. Bring on the clowns. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.853 2009-07-31T15:31:23Z 2009-07-31T15:43:20Z

It's a great time for football in Australia - except for one thing we dare not talk about....

Matthew Hall It's a great time for football in Australia - except for one thing we dare not talk about. This means a match review panel can discipline players after the event if the referee has awarded a penalty or an opponent has been sent off as the result of a dive. Entertainment, ahoy, times two. While that is all good news, on the other hand perhaps the most significant event impacting football in Australia took place on the other side of the world. Last Sunday, CONCACAF, the confederation for North and Central America, held the final of its regional Championship at Giants Stadium in New York in front of 80,000 fans, most of them supporting Mexico against the United States. Flashing lights: The crowd figure is importantly tied to the fact both the US and Mexico fielded second- or third-choice teams. Also important is that FIFA President Sepp Blatter was in the crowd, watching the huge support for a match that barely matters. Also on his itinerary? While Australian cities wrangle over just the idea of constructing potential stadiums, Blatter was already on a walk-through of the New Meadowlands, a state-of-the-art arena that will be a likely venue if the US hosts either the 2018 or 2022 FIFA World Cups. Take a look here. Blatter also visited the White House, met with President Obama, and extended an invitation to the Prez to attend next year's World Cup in South Africa with his family, including his soccer-playing daughters. But it is what Blatter told US Soccer Federation President Sunil Gulati after meeting Obama that may be crucial to Australia's World Cup host hopes - or lack of them. It's something that has been overlooked by pretty much all Australian media, too busy wearing green and gold goggles to look at reality of global football politics. (Except for this report here by, um, me). Blatter told Gulati this week that FIFA Executive Committee members are torn between Europe and North America for 2018 - a position that may knock Australia out of contention for both tournaments. "If FIFA were following a policy of rotation then it would in fact be North America's turn [in 2018]," Blatter said, according to Gulati. (Note: Note to Oceania - not your turn). "There are some within the Executive Committee that would like [North America in 2018] to be the case and that there are other members of the Executive Committee that would prefer every third World Cup should be in Europe, in which case 2018 will be more likely for Europe," said Gulati, relaying Blatter's views. In other words, let Europe take 2018 and get ready for USA 2022. Blatter, a big football flirt, has a track record of playing to the gallery and publicly saying what he believes the audience at the time wants to hear, especially when it comes to World Cup bids. But once in a while the truth slips out. The United States has a powerful case and Australia's World Cup bid may require more than a scenic and telegenic commercial with an invitation to 'come play'. In New York and Washington DC, Australia's bid may have hit the wall. Just don't tell anyone in Australia. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.848 2009-07-24T14:49:51Z 2009-07-24T14:56:39Z

Thankfully, Cristiano Ronaldo's soap opera transfer saga was painlessly short this year. But that just left more time for suffering elsewhere....

Matthew Hall Thankfully, Cristiano Ronaldo's soap opera transfer saga was painlessly short this year. But that just left more time for suffering elsewhere. a move to a club in Saudi Arabia that flipped and flopped across the Internet when it was as bizarre as it was untrue. For me, the best transfer news is that of a deal conducted without speculation that comes totally from left field. Call me old, but I lived and worked in London in the 1990s and recall the first time I learned of Manchester United's audacious swoop of Eric Cantona from Leeds United was when I spotted it on the front page of newspapers at the local Tube station the morning after the deal had gone through. Cantona? Manchester United? A similar situation played out this month with United picking up Michael Owen, once a hero for Liverpool fans and now maybe something of Public Enemy #1 at Anfield after signing for the dreaded Red Devils. Bang - it happened. WTF? Now let's move on. But unfortunately for Australian fans, Mark Viduka and Lucas Neill are providing us unnecessary pain. According to speculation (ha!), Neill should sign for Galatasaray this weekend after wrangling with the club over financial aspects of a proposed deal for many weeks. Neill was probably also looking to see what action was happening elsewhere, if anything, but the Turkish club became so frustrated at taking over a month to sort out the deal that they lined up Julio Belletti as a possible replacement, believing that paying 5 million euros to Chelsea for the Brazilian was a better deal than talking money with Australia's captain. Neill's long and winding move to Galatasaray sent Australian fans into a fever with keyboard generals in a fury as to why he'd turn his back on the Premier League and West Ham for Turkey. Clubless Viduka, meanwhile, is still on holiday on Croatia's idyllic Dalmatian coast which is perhaps not the best environment to consider your professional future. After all, would you enjoy having to contemplate the reality of a winter in Hull (whose local team has been considered, and then dismissed, as a possible destination) while fishing with dynamite off the coast of Split, (a pastime that Viduka has been known to enjoy)? Fortunately for Viduka, who has never been fast to make any decision, and unfortunately for us, he has until the end of August to decide the location of his new home, if indeed there is to be one. If he's true to form, he may skip the first half of the up-coming season, pick up a club in January and coast towards the FIFA World Cup next year to play a few games with Pim Verbeek's Socceroos. Although that's just speculation. What's been your most-talked about transfer of the off-season? Follow me on Twitter here. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.844 2009-07-17T14:24:08Z 2009-07-17T14:46:54Z

This weekend, David Beckham will run on to the pitch with AC Milan. Unfortunately for him, he'll be wearing a Los Angeles Galaxy shirt....

Matthew Hall This weekend, David Beckham will run on to the pitch with AC Milan. Unfortunately for him, he'll be wearing a Los Angeles Galaxy shirt. A flash of truth. It was as if we were having a separate, private, conversation in a room off to the side away from the 50 or so international media around us. Most reporters in the room missed that moment and Beckham's confession. Maybe, for Beckham's machine, just as well. Seconds later, he was off again maintaining how "committed" he was to his current situation. But, don't worry America, in his own mind Beckham is no doubt "committed", not least because he has a contract that requires him to be and Beckham, as he reminded everyone on Thursday, always honours his contracts. But this is where it gets complicated for Beckham and his crowded calendar. He also wants to play at the 2010 World Cup and England coach Fabio Capello has told him he needs to play in a higher standard league than MLS to be considered. Enter Milan, and Beckham was mostly right when he said that if the Italian club telephoned any player with an invitation to join them they'd all drop what they were doing immediately to take up the opportunity. But this is where Beckham digs his own grave. Unfortunately for him he is not "any player". He is not Freddie Ljungberg, the former Arsenal and West Ham player now at Seattle Sounders. Nor is he former Manchester United star Dwight Yorke when the Trinidad & Tobago international was with Sydney FC in Australia' A-League. Nor is he Robbie Fowler, once an England contemporary, now the marquee player of North Queensland Fury, a new team in a growing league from an obscure tropical country town, contemplating an offer to return to Tranmere Rovers. Beckham arrived in America with fireworks and a cloud of promise that he'd help build and grow MLS and soccer in America. He still talks about being an "ambassador" for American soccer. It is all about the soccer, Beckham blubbed, rather than his celebrity. But in reality it's absolutely more than what happens on the pitch, which makes Beckham either totally unaware or stupid. Americans love statistics and here are some. Two years ago, 66,237 fans attended the New York Red Bulls match against David Beckham's LA Galaxy, his first game in the league (see, there is a market for soccer in New York). Last year, around 50,000 attended the corresponding fixture. On Thursday night, Galaxy beat New York 3-1. But just 23,238 turned up to see Beckham's return in Galaxy colours. This is before we even get to pitiful television ratings that have not been nudged since Beckham's arrival. That's the fail. And as his Posh Spice wife surely could tell him, when the numbers don't add up, it's time to shut the circus down. No wonder he'd rather be wearing a Milan shirt this weekend. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.839 2009-07-10T15:29:42Z 2009-07-10T15:36:15Z

80,000 Spaniards can't be wrong. Can they?...

Matthew Hall 80,000 Spaniards can't be wrong. Can they? 80,000 people. All there to watch and listen as Ronaldo, dressed in his Real Madrid strip, said nothing much of interest beyond the predictable platitudes to anything and everyone associated with the free-spending Spanish club that now pays his astronomical salary. Real Madrid gave Manchester United around $300 million to acquire Ronaldo's contract, cash that no right-thinking company (key word) would turn down for any of its assets. Ronaldo, ever immodest, told the masses that he thought Madrid's excess was appropriate. "I'm happy to be the most expensive player in the world and I'm going to prove that they did the right thing to pay good money for me," he announced at a press conference after his introduction to fans. Apparently, there is something of an economic crisis enveloping the planet but it obviously hasn't hit Madrid, or the higher echelons of football just yet. By the beginning of July, Real Madrid had spent close to $500 million (that's Australian dollars) on transfer fees alone in its 2009 recruiting drive. That money, distributed between other rich clubs like Manchester United, Milan, and Lyon for their talented players, is funded mostly by bank and building society loans. Real Madrid President Florentino Perez believes the investment to be worth it and has convinced the banks that the club will recoup the money through replica shirt sales and marketing. There you have it: the President of one of the world's "richest" clubs has revealed his business is actually the rag trade rather than football. But with 80,000 people turning up on a balmy summer night to see nothing much, it's possible Perez is smarter than most of us. Footballers now have more reach globally than most other live public figures. A conference in London last week, that attracted former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and film director David Puttnam as speakers, discussed exactly that. "Most world leaders I have met enjoy something about sport, and some even play," Blair said at the Beyond Sport talkfest. "But I think over the years it has become of a different magnitude, and we are only just beginning to understand the utility of sports." Blair told a story about visiting a Japanese classroom where the word "Beckham" provided the kids a clue as to who Blair was. Puttnam, the director of films Chariots of Fire and The Killing Fields, thinks sport is the new global power. "There is no movie star in the world who could get thousands of people to wait six hours just to see their arrival, as Cristiano Ronaldo did this week," Puttnam said. "The whole level of globalization of sports is bigger." ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.834 2009-07-03T15:01:49Z 2009-07-03T15:09:59Z

If they could, would Australia's Indigenous kids want to be David Beckham?...

Matthew Hall If they could, would Australia's Indigenous kids want to be David Beckham? Los Angeles Galaxy? It wasn't Real Madrid was it? This dinner, with 10 teammates, would demonstrate how Beckham's world was so far from his fellow Galaxy players. When the steaks were eaten and the bill arrived, tension mounted. Landon Donovan, the team's captain, knew this moment, insignificant in many ways but totally revealing in many others, could make or break how Beckham would fit into his new team. Here was the thing: Beckham's salary was 100-times more than many of his new teammates. Donovan, the next-biggest earner at Galaxy after Beckham on close to USD$1 million, had previously picked up bills for his less enumerated teammates. But on this occasion? Egalitarian Beckham put in his share of the bill and passed it along for teammates to put in what they owed. Regardless of how the bill was split, and regardless of whether millionaire Beckham should have picked up the check for his first team dinner, perception is everything in professional football. It's apparent with what players wear off the field, with what vehicles they drive to training, with their choice of wives or girlfriend. For Beckham, who should have known better, the perception among his poorer teammates was that the superstar millionaire new boy was a cheapskate. "You can look at it two ways," said Galaxy player Chris Klein. "Here's this guy that's making a lot of money, and maybe he should pick up the tab. But the other side of it is, maybe he's trying so hard to be one of the guys, if he's paying for everything then he's not one of the guys anymore." It's a highwire walk and Beckham, who always wants to be "one of the guys", was likely to fall off no matter which decision he took. If indeed he actually did make a conscious decision. At the other end of the football universe, so far away from the showbiz circus of Becksmania that you can barely see it, Indigenous kids from Australia will gather in Townsville Queensland this week for the first Indigenous Football Festival. As a Football Federation Australia press release claims, the festival is "an integral part of the National Football Development Plan. The Indigenous Football Development Program is a 10 year national plan to increase the number of Indigenous people playing football." Said FFA CEO, Ben Buckley: "We believe we have a responsibility to encourage more young people of Indigenous background to play football as a way to improve their life through better health, better education and improved skills." Buckley is right, if only because football/soccer/whatever-you-want-to-call-it has a poor track record of developing Indigenous talent even when it claims a high profile roll call local soccer legends that includes the legendary Harry Williams, the late Charlie Perkins, and James Moriarty. You can head into the bush and see thousands of Australian kids wearing Socceroos, Barcelona, Manchester United, and Liverpool shirts. The catch is most of them play their football Aussie Rules style. That's not a bad thing but maybe this week's tournament, that includes games between Yallorin Of The North, Borroloola Cyclones and Giralang Galang, is a step toward an Indigenous player one day being at the same table as David Beckham. And picking up the tab. In totally dud news, former Sun Herald sports editor James Carey passed away last week after an illness, aged 41. Among other great things, it should be noted James was a driving force behind Fairfax's Sydney publications adopting the word "football" over "soccer" as editorial policy. RIP. I have been on Twitter for a while. You can follow me here. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.831 2009-06-27T20:03:18Z 2009-06-28T14:37:11Z

Last week's win by the USA over Spain has wider implications than just another case of flukey giant killing....

Matthew Hall Last week's win by the USA over Spain has wider implications than just another case of flukey giant killing. THAT?!" The 2-0 victory, where the USA was initially pitched as whipping boys against European Champions trying to extend a record unbeaten streak, had touched many corners of the country. "Has all of America got Confederations Cup fever?" emailed football fanatic from Sydney. Well, no. But in a new American era of "Yes, we can," the win had cut into the American psyche. "I can't explain it any more than you can," said US goalkeeper Tim Howard, a teammate of Socceroo Tim Cahill, after the match. There are many parallels between football's development in America and Australia. Similar histories, similar demographics, similar challenges, and for the administrators, similar goals. Both countries, too, are now rivals to host the 2018 or 2022 FIFA World Cups, each in their own style. While the US has called on a statesman like Henry Kissinger or California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to talk up its credentials, Australia's campaign has called on a truck driver, as representative of an everyman Aussie, to invite the world to "Come play". Like Australia, 16 members of the 23-man US squad in South Africa play abroad in Europe. Unlike Pim Verbeek, US coach Bob Bradley does believe in players who play in Major League Soccer, the US professional league. His goalscorers against Spain, Clint Dempsey and Jozy Altidore, played for Fulham in the Premier League and in Spain's second division last season but the team's engine and pin-up boy is Landon Donovan, a clean-cut, prematurely-balding, local hero who plays for Los Angeles Galaxy. It was Donovan who relinquished the team's captaincy after the arrival of David Beckham in LA, an experiment that proved celebrity and marquee names are no guarantee of success. But, when glitz and glamour has run back to Europe, what does capture the US imagination is inspiration. It's the have-a-go attitude missing in many of Australia's more recent performances. When was the last time you truly rallied to a Socceroos performance? Was it 2006? The Japan match? The drama against Croatia in Stuttgart? Italy? Unknown, unheard of, written of, Australia had something to prove in Germany and we sort of proved it. Historically, Australian football has inspired when we've stood no chance - against Argentina in 1988 when Frank Arok's team of mongrels pulled style from out of the back of the closet to beat then World Champions Argentina 4-1. Not to bore you with too much nostalgia but the US win has caught the imagination because of its unlikely romance, something that Australian football might like to consider rekindling. Oh, and another thing. It's a win that will have Champagne corks popping at the US Soccer Federation in Chicago for another reason. The United States may lose the 2018 World Cup bid to Europe but beating the best team on that continent in a FIFA tournament will do a lot for their 2022 bid's credibility. Australia - take notice.]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.827 2009-06-20T00:35:41Z 2009-06-20T18:00:24Z

And on the seventh day, we finally got some truth....

Matthew Hall And on the seventh day, we finally got some truth. FourFourTwo, a football-dedicated magazine with limited resources, to scoop News Limited, Fairfax Media, Fox Sports, SBS, Channel Seven, the online bloggerati, Football Federation Australia, and the Internet gossipers to unearth what seems to be a reliable source to speak about what went down during Timmygate. In brief: "Tim's welcome anytime," claimed a guy called Mim Salvato, the owner of the bar where Cahill's shenanigans took place (or not). "They've blown it out of all proportion," Salvato said in an interview published on FourFourTwo's website. "I don't know what they are going on about. I don't want Tim to look like a bad guy. It was just a simple misunderstanding." [Full disclosure - I have written for the British edition of the magazine but rarely for the Australian - the last time may have been in 2006.] Salvato said Cahill had also been at the bar on the night before the alleged incident - after Australia had qualified - without any problems. "If you look even slightly intoxicated, we are not allowed to serve you," explained Salvato. "Tim didn't understand this because he lives in England where you can drink as much as you like. "The doorman got his knickers in a knot. We don't employ the doormen directly. We use a security company and no-one knew who he was. "It was a nothing incident that should never have happened. Tim was just partying and then left. No punches were thrown and nothing else happened. There was no 'disgrace' or 'shame'." "Police only became involved after the media phoned them. They came down, looked at the CCTV video, saw there was nothing to investigate and that was it. "The Telegraph got it way out of line and I don't understand why they have been doing this." In a week that should have been about Australia's bid for the 2018/2022 World Cup and qualification for next year's tournament in South Africa, The Daily Telegraph (and Sunday) certainly succeeded in diverting attention to its beat up. The issue gained traction with Cahill's embarrassing interview after scoring two goals against Japan with host broadcaster Fox Sports after the final whistle. The Everton midfielder's knowledge of cross-media ownership (News Ltd owns a share of Fox Sports through the Premier Sports Group that owns the broadcaster) meaning Cahill now appears disinterested in talking with the FFA broadcast "partner". It's a jungle out there - as Cahill has discovered over the past few days. The saga is further complicated by News Ltd's financial interest in rugby league, a sport riddled at the professional level with so much controversy it should hold its own World Cup just for poor behaviour. Australia would be clear favourites but, on his worst night out, Cahill would struggle to qualify for that tournament. Thankfully, Pim Verbeek came to the rescue. Here he is singing Advance Australia Fair, keeping his promise to do so if the Socceroos qualified for South Africa. As Pim suggests, Australians, all let us re-juice. UPDATE: David Sygall at The Sun-Herald has spoken with Salvato, telling a slightly different version of the story. Salvato, it has been suggested to me, has an interest in staying onside with Cahill rather than a doorman, who is now being discredited. Sigh. You can follow me on Twitter here. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.825 2009-06-12T20:03:03Z 2009-06-12T20:12:01Z

It's official: the world has gone mad....

Matthew Hall It's official: the world has gone mad. what? So it turns out that Ronaldo is the subject of the most-expensive deal ever between football clubs and that's before we even try to comprehend his personal starting salary estimated to be over $25 million a year, rising by 25% each subsequent year of his six-year deal. That roughly equals $2 million a month or $500,000 a week. Excuse me if a few zeroes are missing or the math is not exact. The point is, it's a lot of money. Maybe it's the frugal times elsewhere but it's so much money I feel a little sick. For some perspective, around four weeks of Ronaldo's wage equals the entire season's salaries for an entire A-League club. "These figures are simply beyond the understanding of most ordinary fans," said British Sports Minister Gerry Sutcliffe. "I am worried that a small group of rich clubs are getting richer and that does affect the balance and the opportunities for the wider game." The Ronaldo transfer reminds me of a story told to me by my friend Andy Bernal, a former Socceroo who among other adventures, was David Beckham's minder when he, like Ronaldo, moved from Manchester United to Real Madrid. When the Portuguese youngster was announced as Beckham's replacement at Old Trafford, wife Posh Spice sat in Madrid pawing newspapers analysing the new recruit. Apparently, she was unimpressed. "Nah," she said in her Essex-inspired whine. "He's not in our league, is he?" She was wrong but sort of right. Morally objectionable or not (and there's plenty more to suggest that there's something deeply wrong with what's occurring), the facts are that Ronaldo and Real Madrid are out of, not just Beckham's league, but our universe. ]]> tag:blogs.sunherald.com.au,2009:/matthewhall//5.820 2009-06-05T21:18:15Z 2009-06-05T21:22:26Z

By the time you read this, it's likely Australia will have qualified for the 2010 FIFA World Cup....

Matthew Hall By the time you read this, it's likely Australia will have qualified for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Typically, this is the media's fault, which apparently has widely condemned the performances of his side. "I work with the players, the players know what we are doing, the players know the plan, the players know the difficulties we are facing, (so) for the rest I'm not so interested," Verbeek said. Australia's impressive results deserve acclaim, he added: "The [players] fly from Europe, they have nine hours time difference, they arrive one day before the Japan game, they have 74,000 people (in the crowd) and they have a 0-0 draw." "Ninety-nine per cent of the countries in the world would say 'great result' but the Aussies have a different opinion. "I can understand my players start to get a little bit annoyed about that because then they have to fly back (to Europe) and play in some of the toughest leagues in the world. "I think a little bit more respect would have (been nice)." Tim Cahill, staying on message, had similar gripes last week. "I am sick of it, people who are criticising us in the situation we are in, purely because we are one point away from qualifying for the World Cup," said the Everton midfielder. Maybe this siege mentality, the us-against-them, is part of Verbeek's psychological motivation for his team. Or perhaps some of the players are more detached from reality than we think. Because here's the thing: there has been very little actual criticism of the players or the team's performances. The Socceroos get a very soft ride from a largely uncritical (some might even suggest uneducated) Australian media. If Verbeek or his players genuinely believe they're being sniped at, then they might want to play for England or Italy or Brazil or Argentina, where a feral national media has every pulse of their national team monitored 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Why? Because in those countries, the national team belongs to the people, the nation. Not the coach or the players or team management or the Federation. Here are the facts: Verbeek and his players have done a great job to be able to knock on South Africa's front door with games to spare. Yes, they have created history to qualify for only the third time. Team performances have been intelligent, tactically smart, and pretty pragmatic. Preparation for matches has been top rate. Entertaining? For the hardcore, sometimes. For the casual fan, the great unwashed, the "market" that carries the sport into the mainstream, never. That's neither good nor bad. It just is. But now, with the team in the box seat for qualification, Australian fans deserve as much respect, if not more, than the players themselves are asking for. After all, it's their own money that paid for them to support the team around the world over years of heartache and their own tears that were shed over previous defeats. The reason we might have a different opinion that other countries, Pim, is that we have a different history. Verbeek may have replaced glorious failure with pragmatic success and for that we thank him for achieving what you were tasked to do. But a little lighter on the sense of entitlement and, in this game, you don't get trophies just for showing up. Or do you? ]]>