I was in Australia during the Qatar WC. The Socceroos did bloody well and for a few short weeks, football was the no 1 conversation for sports fans. Unfortunately for the FA a WC is only every 4 years, but playing a few big home WC qualifiers each cycle against Saudi, Japan etc - plus the Asian Cup, keeps the Socceroos relevant.
Aussie has a hugely competitive sports market. The FA always have a tough fight keeping football in the sports pages. Returning to OFC (not that the Islands countries will want them), would be seen as a massive negative backwards step, that the other codes would gloat over.
In gross GDP NZ sits 50 in the world. Most importantly as Carlind points out we have 1 professional football team, that starts about 4-6 Kiwis per week. The most important resource in an international football context is your player base. Our's is tiny compared to most countries in FIFA's top 50. Anyway being a poorer country doesn't stop you spending big on football. Ex Peru boss Gareca reportedly turned down a new offer of $USD2M/yr from the Peru FA. They sit 49th on that gross GDP list. But their FA is obviously a fair bit 'richer' than ours.
Aussie has a hugely competitive sports market. The FA always have a tough fight keeping football in the sports pages. Returning to OFC (not that the Islands countries will want them), would be seen as a massive negative backwards step, that the other codes would gloat over.
In gross GDP NZ sits 50 in the world. Most importantly as Carlind points out we have 1 professional football team, that starts about 4-6 Kiwis per week. The most important resource in an international football context is your player base. Our's is tiny compared to most countries in FIFA's top 50. Anyway being a poorer country doesn't stop you spending big on football. Ex Peru boss Gareca reportedly turned down a new offer of $USD2M/yr from the Peru FA. They sit 49th on that gross GDP list. But their FA is obviously a fair bit 'richer' than ours.
I guess at the beginning. In response to the proposal that Australia has greatly proved since 2006 my response in the role as devils advocate was that they have not improved greatly since (ie: a 17 year period) and that their recent success at the world cup was due to Graham Arnold. Your reply is to agree that they did well at this world cup ignoring the totality of the counter argument and then defeat your own argument by saying football was popular for a few weeks in Australia. Well it was briefly in 2010 in NZ as well.
Sorry but then comes the worst point. I am not sure how well you understand economics but I will try to be respectful. How can you look at gdp and not look at gdp per Capita??! Do you actually believe that people living in Peru have the same standard of living as NZ and the same access per head of population to opportunity and resources?! Have you seen the grinding poverty in which many people of Peru live? They are by the way currently under going a coup. Show me any list where the standard of living in NZ is ranked 50th in the world? On GDP nominal per Capita NZ sits 22nd. Unfortunately you completely buy in to this "little old NZ" garbage that infects NZ thinking and culture. It's economics which provides opportunity.The population is not even that small. If NZ was in Europe,out of 50 countries, just based on population NZ comes in at around 25. You also completely ignore the example of Iceland with a population of Christchurch which can't even play outside 9 months of the year.
To other points you ignore. We have 90 professionals playing world wide. You say player base is most important and then proceed to ignore anyone Playing outside NZ ? How come?
Can a poor country spend big on one aspect/one position in their entire football infrastructure? Yes. Is it advisable and the case normally? No.