Time to Look Locally?

Who will be the next Perth Glory Coach? That is the question around the football community in Perth.

In an article on The World Game website four names were thrown up last week, all four already have an involvement at the club, Hayden Foxe, Richard Garcia, Steve McGarry and Bobby Despotovski. All ex-players, and all with legitimate claims to the job. Another name that has been doing the rounds has been that of Ernie Merrick, who has proven A-League success at each club he has worked at. Experience that could be vital, depending on the long term vision of the club, if there actually is one.

While there will always be coaches wanting the job, as there are limited top level opportunities available in Australia, the turnover of A-League coaches at the Perth Glory may well deter some. There have been seven coaches and one caretaker coach in the 15 years of the Hyundai A-League. Of those eight coaches three have strong ties with Western Australia, Alan Vest who took over as caretaker when Steve McMahon walked out, Alistair Edwards, and Kenny Lowe, the latter the longest serving head coach holding the position for four years and five months. Lowe’s time in charge means the club has got through seven coaches in 11 years!

Ask any of the coaches who have come from over East and most will freely admit that Perth is a hard place to come and coach. It is hard because the development of local players has been impacted heavily by poor structures that have undone all of the good work that was being done in the past. It is hard because the people of Perth are very parochial. It is hard because Western Australians irrespective of the sport they follow want success, and tend to only come out when their teams are successful.

If the playing numbers constantly being promoted by Football West are to be believed, which is that there are in excess of 240,000 people playing the game, then one has to wonder why the Perth Glory’s average attendance is only around 9,000. The Football West number does not even take into account the number of football fans who don’t play the game! Clearly there are a great many issues surrounding the club, and the game in Western Australia. The average home crowd over 15 seasons is 8,975, and only twice has the average attendance in a season been over 10,000. Is it poor marketing? Is it the standard of football? Is it those running the club? Is it the owner?

The truth is in some part that it is all of the above. Apart from the turnover of coaches the club has had six CEO’s since Tony Sage took over the club in 2007. So there have been almost as many CEO’s as coaches. As the CEO and the Coach are two of the most important staff at a football club, this could be a reason. As whatever long term goal any may have had, it never lasts more than a couple of years before someone else comes in and turns it upside down and implements their own ideas.

One major issue is that the club no longer resonates with the Perth community. It is not alone in that, this is an issue facing nearly every football club in the A-League, they need to have an identity and stand for values that resonant with their community. (Finding An IdentityThe Key Moving Forward).

Along with that identity there needs to be one clear message coming from the club. At present there are too many voices. Comments are made by the owner, the CEO, The Director of Football and the coach. There should only be two voices and as far as the fans are concerned the most important is the coach. Only in Australia do administrators at the club garner so much interest and column centimetres on line and in the press!

What is the goal moving forward? What does the club want to achieve, and how is it going to achieve it? An Asian Champions League place has been achieved so that can be ticked off the list. Sure it would be great to have that as a regular occurrence, but that will never happen with the current turnover of coaching staff and players. Manchester United’s Sir Alex Ferguson is strongly linked to success after winning 38 trophies in 26 years, but it took him three years to win his first. He was appointed in 1986 and it took a while for his methods and the players he wanted to take root at Old Trafford. His first trophy was the 1989 FA Cup, and many have said that had he not won that he would have been sacked. Things would have been very different had that been the case. Had he been at Perth Glory the odds are that he would never have survived to have the opportunity as the average tenure of a coach is less than two years.

So looking at Perth Glory and the coaching position that is available will the in-coming coach be given a reasonable amount of time in which to turn the club into a perennially successful one?

Will all the composite parts that are essential come together to make the club successful?

The general consensus is split between a coach with a record of success and going back to basics, and going local. Certainly most fans do not want to see a big name appointed to satisfy the owner’s ego.

If the club were to go local there is much to be said for the candidature of Bobby Despotvski and Richard Garcia. Both are local boys, both were born in the city and both have gone on and had successful careers. Despotovski was a cult hero in his playing days for Perth Glory forming one of the most feared strike forces in Australian football alongside Damian Mori.

Since retiring from playing he has coached in the NPL, and has also coached the Perth Glory Youth and the Perth Glory women.

Richard Garcia’s youth career was at Olympic Kingsway, but at 15 he joined the West Ham United academy. He went on to sign professional terms with the club but after limited opportunities moved on to Colchester United, and Hull City before returning to Australia and playing with Melbourne Heart, Sydney FC and then Perth Glory.

Garcia made 17 appearances for the Socceroos and Despotovski four.

There is no doubt that both of these individuals have a feel for the local scene, and may therefore be able to identify talent and work to bring it up to the A-League standard, but that is not going to happen overnight. Before that happens one feels that some strong fence-mending needs to happen between the A-League club and the local clubs.

Two key areas that need to be addressed are the payment to local clubs for players signed by the Glory. Also, and this may go against the FFA’s wishes but the Perth Glory Youth set up needs to be revised and young players released back to their clubs to play. Those with talent can then attend additional training sessions with the Perth Glory coaches in order to lift their game.

The current system is not working and robbing the local game of potential talent. These young players are more likely to flourish playing alongside grown men, who will teach them how to hold their own, and at the same time protect them, than they will playing together and being bullied off the ball physically. Such a move would help bolster the playing stocks of the local clubs, which in turn would make the local competition more attractive. At the end of the day the local game and the Perth Glory would both win. The local clubs have to be the feeder clubs for the A-League club. This is not Europe, distances and the population are prohibitive to an academy system producing similar results.

In the current climate no one wins. There is no connection with the Perth Glory and local clubs as the young talent is snatched away from them, and then never seen at their original club. That link is very important. It was a link that was crucial in the club’s successful days in the NSL. There was a connection between the local clubs and the stars representing their community wearing the Perth Glory colours.

Could these two candidates individually, or even combined be the ones to lift Perth Glory out of the place that it currently sits? Being local one can’t help feeling that they could help pull back the fans, by once more connecting the club with the local football community?

It is interesting to hear how the parochial nature of the Perth people is seen as a disadvantage. In many facets of life here in Western Australia it is, especially the culture built up around “Perthanalaties.” However when it comes to sport it is a bonus. If you tap into the parochial feeling and nurture it, who knows what could happen in terms of your support and following.

If Garcia or Despotovski were selected independently both may opt to look at the local coaching scene when it comes to appointing an assistant. Something that would go a long way to fixing the links between the local game and the A-League club. Certainly rather than being distant from the local game they need to start welcoming the past players, and coaches with experience into the fold. Chris Coyne has been very successful over the years with Bayswater City, he too played in England, played for the Glory and Australia, could he not be a valuable asset linking the club back into the football community? He is just one amongst many.

One thing is for sure, the club needs to start to connect not just with the football community in Perth but the community as a whole. This year many felt a total disconnect with the club thanks in part to the lack of Western Australian involvement. As mentioned here in the West they love parochial!

If Garcia and Despotovski were keen to take on the role maybe they should back themselves with the club’s owner. Bobby Despotovski would be well aware of how in the early years of the club’s participation in the National Soccer League the players negotiated a bonus if the crowds were higher than a set level. Maybe a similar incentive should be negotiated, so that it is in the players interests then to engage the community. For too long recently the Perth Glory players have become invisible around town, and as a result the relevance of the club in the Perth sporting community has fallen. No longer are Glory tickets much sought after, now many a free ticket is not even used.

The club has to reconnect not just with Perth but with Western Australia. Something a CEO from the Eastern States would never understand. Something that Tony Popovic did not seem to care about. Some would say why should he? After all he is the coach his job is to win games. Yet a football club is so much more than that, as anyone who has been a supporter will tell you. That aloofness, that sense of distance between the coach and the fans has played a major part in the disconnect between the club and the people of Perth, and Western Australia. Maybe that is something that only those who have lived here a long time can appreciate.

Many feel that is why Tony Sage has to choose a local to revitalise and regenerate his club. If he wants to survive the turbulent next few years coming up for the A-League he has to have a far more long term plan than a vision for one or two seasons. The club has to go back to basics and not look to buy success, but to nurture it from within. Where did the majority of players that lifted Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United come from? They came from within.

Sure the club may lose a few players to overseas clubs, but that is the business of football. That will be a benefit to the club in the long term. They key is that the nucleus of the side is local, with key players who fulfil roles within that team being brought in. No longer can players be signed based on who their agent is. They have to be right for the club both on the pitch and off of it. If they are not prepared to promote the club away from a game day, then they are not the player the club needs at this point in time.

Too many local players have left Western Australia only to shine at other clubs in the A-League. That too has bred frustration amongst fans, why were they let go?

It is time for a change throughout. No more press conferences where nothing meaningful is ever said, and cliches are trotted out. Kill the background noise and let the fans hear only from the coach. They only time they want to hear from the CEO is when a coach is appointed or sacked. From the owner only when he is selling the club to a legitimate buyer.

It is time for all to work together for the good of the game in WA rather than everyone pulling in different directions, and letting personal agendas and egos hold the game back.

Talk to those who were there are the start, park your pride. What Nick Tana and paul Afkos created from scratch was remarkable in terms of how Perth Glory almost immediately became a part of the Perth’s sporting landscape. Gary Marocchi and Micky Brennan then managed to mould a team of essentially local players into a truly competitive team, that almost made the finals in their first season. How did they all achieve so much success so quickly? In put from them could help turn the club around.

What maybe forgotten by the current generation is how long the people running football in Perth fought to be included in the National competition. Perth Glory was the result of years of campaigning. Maybe that was what made it special. Now that is forgotten and its place in the A-League is simply accepted and expected. It is often important to know your club’s history, to give you a sense of what it means to the people. It is unlikely that anyone employed at the club today would know even part of that history apart from those who grew up here or lived here in that period. If you disrespect your history, you will always struggle.

One cannot help feeling that there has never been a better time to restore the passion and pride back into the Perth Glory. If you grew up here you would know what that means, Garcia and Despotvski do. The question is would an outsider?

Guaranteed there will be some who will say that both are inexperienced at A-League level, and they would be right. If that is the case then maybe employ an experienced coach to act as a mentor to guide them in the background. Someone happy to share their knowledge in order to progress the careers of two younger coaches. The key is finding a way to make it work. The club has to be returned to the Perth community or it will continue to only just keep its head above water.