Can I insert a free plug....?
In the national league life cycle there is always the most enthusiasm and fervour for belonging on the cusp of a revamp - of which we have had five major ones since 1992 (superclub, summer, North & South Island leagues, winter, NZFC), and many minor ones (10 teams, 11 teams, three rounds, two rounds, playoff variations, age-group team additions, Phoenix addition).
It's usually in year 2 or 3 after a revamp that it all goes a bit flat.
To appreciate how history often repeats, read The National League Debates - , available via www.nationalleaguedebates.weebly.com
BLURB....
At a time when the future of New Zealand’s national league is once again under review, it may be timely for fans to revisit a few of the leading – and not-so-leading - ideas about our football structures which have emerged over the past 25 years.
“The National League Debates: A potted chronology of the twists, turns and conflicting ideas in New Zealand football since 1990” examines the historic ferment over the challenges of finding a sustainable format for our flagship competition.
For a competition that has been in existence for 45 years, there have been remarkably few publications dedicated to the national league.
But this 276-page manuscript is arguably even rarer, insofar as the focus of The National League Debates is strictly on the politics of the game, and arguments over how our football should be structured, as opposed to physical production of football and the on-field dramas.
It sets out a chronology of the twists, turns and conflicting ideas that the code has grappled with over an extended period of time.
In an era when our national league has evolved to feature both an age-group team (Wanderers SC) and a Reserve team (Wellington Phoenix), there is naturally plenty to ponder.
And yet, this most curious composition is arguably no stranger than some of the other structural convolutions chronicled within The National League Debates.
Think of the four points for a win and penalty shootouts for a draw instituted in 1996. Or the bonus point for scoring more than three goals of the 2000 season.
We’ve moved from a national league to regional leagues and back again, from winter to summer, and juggled with ideas such as franchising and representative teams with a great deal of debate not just about what was best for football, but also about what was and wasn’t acceptable as methods of work in effecting change.
This publication records the essence of the leading ideas of the day, both for and against, on just about everything that affected the national league since 1990, from the sobering costs levied on participants to the sometimes surreal administrative hierarchies the league has operated (or occasionally failed to operate) under.
It is not a “told-you-so” compilation. I have no axe to grind either way with questions of summer v winter, regional v national, clubs v franchises, or any of the myriad of stances adapted by the game’s personalities.
My motivation in cobbling together this chronology has been to add to the fabric of the game. Statistics can usually be tracked down, but so little seems to get recorded in terms of the social history of New Zealand football.
I’d hate to see such a turbulent and interesting period, during which we surrendered then reclaimed a national league not once, not twice, but three times – and have now decided to take a fourth look at it - ever be glibly recorded in a one-dimensional good-versus-bad manner.
Likewise, at times the processes employed to try and effect change seemed brutally abrupt. At others it they were tediously protracted.
It’s a frightening thought, but the things people said, the varied arguments and recurrent themes recorded here, are about to be debated all over again.
If there has been one element of consistency it is the continual battle for survival within whatever governing structure we have. As one chronology entry from Sitter fanzine, May 1997, notes...
It is hard work being a national league club. By its very nature, the national league attacks the onion of a soccer club, removing layer after layer of club life until it gets down to the little sliver of ambition and commitment at the core.
Or, as one of the final chronology entries from 2004 notes:
“Since its inception in 1970, the National League has been all things to all people. For every champion side there was a team of strugglers; for every boom gate there was a pitiful turnout; for every good import there was an overweight liar getting off a plane. In short, the national league through the years has been hit or miss, with an equal share of each.”