No doubt there was a collective sigh of relief amongst the staff of Football Australia following Andrew Redmayne’s save in the penalty shoot-out against Peru that saw Australia qualify for its fifth consecutive World Cup.
Congratulations must be extended to Graham Arnold and his coaching staff as well as all the players involved in all of the qualifying games. This writer will put his hand up and say that he did not believe that they would qualify. Why? In my humble opinion because Australia lacked the quality to qualify.
The campaign has been a tough one, 20 games and 16 of those away from home. No team has probably ever had a tougher qualifying journey. Maybe that was why at times it wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t inspiring and the team was even at times a little fortunate.
While euphoria spread across the nation at Redmayne’s save, which will undoubtedly be replayed again and again for years to come, my thoughts went to Mat Ryan, the goalkeeper who helped Australia reach the lottery of the penalty shoot-out and who was subbed to allow Redmayne to take centre-stage. Some will call it a coaching masterstroke by Graham Arnold, and they may be right. Peru’s coaches would no doubt have done their homework on Mat Ryan when it comes to penalties, but would they have done it with Redmayne?
Leading Australia’s qualifying campaign for Russia in 2018 was their captain Mile Jedinak, who not only wore the captain’s armband on his sleeve but his heart too. His passion, his determination, his leadership and more importantly his goals were the reason Australia qualified four years ago.
In this campaign there has been one shining light again for Australia, goalkeeper Mat Ryan. Game after game he has pulled off crucial saves to keep Australia’s World Cup dream alive. Yes, that is his job, but how many will remember how well he did that job or the key part that he played in years to come? For the piece of footage that will be replayed will be the save made by Redmayne to deny Alex Valera. When it truth it should be a compilation of the key saves made by Ryan.
Mat Ryan is the true hero, just as Jedinak was four years ago. Hopefully most football fans will remember that for years to come.
Of course with qualification comes the USD$9million windfall. Money that Football Australia desperately needs. Where would they have been without it? Let us not kid ourselves this is a lifeline for the game in Australia
The crucial question that now has to be asked is how is this money going to be spent? The Football public saw the windfall from the 2006 World Cup spent before the then FFA received it. The money chewed up in bonuses for the players and more importantly the coaching staff.
The last 16 years has shown that the money from World Cup qualification has not been wisely invested. It has not been spent on developing the generation that will hopefully be qualifying in 12 years time. It has been squandered.
Football fans in Australia need to ask where this money is going to be spent.
They also need to ask how many FA staff will be heading to Qatar and for what purpose?
The sport cannot afford for freeloaders to be taken along for the ride. The CEO obviously has to be there, and possibly the Chairman of the Board, but why do any other Board members really need to be there? If they wish to travel to Qatar then they should pay their own way. If the FA pays for them to travel or picks up their accommodation will they declare these perks?
When it comes to employees of the FA, again no one should be travelling unless they are working. A case put forward for their need to be there and the cost evaluated.
Football in Australia cannot afford to try and live the highlife at this point in time. It needs to be frugal, it needs to spend any money that comes in wisely, and when it does spend, it must have an eye on the future.
Imagine if a minimum of $1million was set aside to enable a set number of children to play for free in each state across the country for the next four years. Suddenly players who have been lost to the game because of the outrageous costs to play could find a way back into the system. Football would be able to move away from the elitist path that has been created in which the best payers are playing rather than the best players and we could return the game back to the average man and woman on the street.
Football has always been a game for the people, the win last on Monday evening/Tuesday morning showed how much it means to the average person in Australia, but many of those celebrating have disengaged from the A-League and the NPL around the country. They love football, traditional football, the romance of a World Cup where the dreamers play against those who historically been the best.
Those running the game need to get their head around that and understand that no matter how much money you spend trying to create that you will fail. The reason being that what you are trying to create is not authentic, and fans will not buy in.
Once the excitement and hysteria dies down, hopefully the high performance unit are looking at what they can do between now and the 22nd of November to make this squad competitive in a group that includes France, Denmark and Tunisia.
While it is great to compete at the World Cup, Australia has only won two games in their four recent appearances. That is two wins in 13 games. They have not won a game since 23rd June 2010 when they defeated Serbia 2-1 in Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit. For the past two tournaments that the team has qualified for, they have not won a game. For the game to grow it has to be about more than qualification, about more than simply saying we were there. Australia has to be competitive and start winning games at that level.
This reflects the lack of progress made in the past 18 years. It also is a valid argument as to why Gianni Infantino, the President of FIFA’s plan to expand the competition to 48 teams in 2026 is foolhardy, as you will ultimately be rewarding mediocrity. A World Cup should be about the best in the World, the cream of the crop.
Australia is now going to compete with the top 32 teams, and their journey to get there has been a tough one, and all involved should take a bow, especially Mat Ryan, but now is when the hard work starts on the pitch and away from it.
Thanks for the comment Gerry. You are spot on, how quickly everyone forgets. Bonita’s book is certainly a good read as are the others on the bidding farce that took place. Has anything changed? Not much. What is sad is how many other sports appear to be adopting the FIFA model.
What seems to have passed under the radar in the euphoria of qualification is that this is the World Cup Finals that Australia was expecting to host, until Qatar’s 30 pieces of solver torpedoed that. Bonita Mersiades excellent book, “Whatever It Takes” gives the inside story on the whole corrupt bid process. Despite Blatter having been replaced the stench of self interest rules at FIFA. Infantino does absolutely nothing to improve the game.