Aussie Coach Axes A-League Players
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How strong is the A-League? Not strong enough, according to the new Australian coach.
He's been hinting at this for a few weeks, but now he's finally given up on home-based talent and called in his off-shore pros.
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Was always going to happen. This is a do or die game for Aussie.
a.haak
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valeo is right with the noise he has been making this was inivetibale, however i dont agree with his comments about the a-league.
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Just a pity we didn't have a bigger pool of NZ pros playing in the world's top leagues. Apart from a handful in Europe, some in lower leagues, Ricki has to pick his All Whites from the A-League or North American competitions.
A team of Kiwi players of the calibre of Ryan Nelsen would be a dream, as long as they actually answered the call when country and coach called - which the top Aussie pros tend to do. All credit to them!
(Are you listening, Ryan?) 
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It's common sense for Verbeek to select his overseas players, and yes, he intended to do that all along, provided they were available. He could hardly take this for granted though, and the month working with the A League players will have given him valuable insight into their strengths and weaknesses, not to mention familiarising the players with Verbeek's own coaching methods.
This is simply good forward-thinking, not an insult to the A League. Guess which newspaper would be screaming for his head if an A League Oz team lost to Qatar!
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Just a pity we didn't have a bigger pool of NZ pros playing in the world's top leagues. Apart from a handful in Europe, some in lower leagues, Ricki has to pick his All Whites from the A-League or North American competitions.
It is a problem Australia also used to happen when playing against Oceania sides, players don't want to come all the way back, risking injury and grief with their club, for games they are not required for. Now that the Aussies are in the AFC there is no room for complacency. What is interesting is that Pim called one player, Thwaite, back from Europe and then cut him from the squad and sent him back to Norway (or on to Norway, just signed with Brann).A team of Kiwi players of the calibre of Ryan Nelsen would be a dream, as long as they actually answered the call when country and coach called - which the top Aussie pros tend to do. All credit to them!
(Are you listening, Ryan?)
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Valeo got it right the WCQ at home is a must win and the best available will get picked. But what the media are not saying is by having 20 or so of the A-Leagues best and generally youngest, over four weeks of Australian Squad training, he is lifting there standard and showing were they have to go in skill, both on and off the ball.
Most of the players I assume all actually would give their eye teeth to play at home in the green amd gold. Thus the standard of the league will lift next year as all these players will lift to try to make the national side.
IMO very clever and far sighted, will also help in the long term in coaching.
Please do not take this the wrong way and I am not wishing to insult............ but to show how the landscrape has changed in OZ making the Socceroos would be every boys & girls dream, cricket then, and a few union & League. My feeling is in NZ an All Black is still the player boys dream of not an All White. So these young men from all clubs will have learnt a lot and I think as I said before will raise their standard and by that the league's standard next season.
As I see it it's all good.
Midfielder2008-02-05 22:36:13Socceroo/ Mariner / Whangarei
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Valeo got it right the WCQ at home is a must win and the best available will get picked. But what the media are not saying is by having 20 or so of the A-Leagues best and generally youngest, over four weeks of Australian Squad training, he is lifting there standard and showing were they have to go in skill, both on and off the ball.
Most of the players I assume all actually would give their eye teeth to play at home in the green amd gold. Thus the standard of the league will lift next year as all these players will lift to try to make the national side.
IMO very clever and far sighted, will also help in the long term in coaching.
Please do not take this the wrong way and I am not wishing to insult............ but to show how the landscrape has changed in OZ making the Socceroos would be every boys & girls dream, cricket then, and a few union & League. My feeling is in NZ an All Black is still the player boys dream of not an All White. So these young men from all clubs will have learnt a lot and I think as I said before will raise their standard and by that the league's standard next season.
As I see it it's all good.
twice in one night that i'm jealous of you Ockers
not happy that your players are improving but i am jealous of the way you've brought the game on, and of course when you get the world cup we'll have to hop the ditch
it's doing me head in
, good night
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Please do not take this the wrong way and I am not wishing to insult............ but to show how the landscrape has changed in OZ making the Socceroos would be every boys & girls dream, cricket then, and a few union & League. My feeling is in NZ an All Black is still the player boys dream of not an All White. So these young men from all clubs will have learnt a lot and I think as I said before will raise their standard and by that the league's standard next season.
I wouldn't go that far. Not yet. Football is still just behind the NRL and a long long way behind AFL. Definately agree about the All Whites v All Blacks thing but it's always going to be like that. If we somehow qualify for a world cup sooner rather than later - it would help.
valeo2008-02-05 23:32:51
a.haak
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Valeo I am not comparing A-League to NRL or AFL teams. Both NRL & AFL wins by a long way no question. But at national level its the Socceroos.
How this was done was very clever by Frank Lowy, he said a number of times in Hal 1 & 2, you can have two teams, you can support Parramattam or Geelong and a football team as well. Then taking the game to a summer time zone (or actually keeping it there) he invited people to come and see.
The first stage of the plan in essence is to make football the number two sport in all states. Given NRL & AFL are stated based then football becomes the national sport and that stage of the plan is almost complete. The next stage is to capture regional Australia and not take on either the AFL & NRL in the capital cities in a big way. This is now in full flow with the gold coast, townsville, to add to the MIGHTY MARINERS , Scum, and the NIx's, then Woolingong. You see regional Australia in NSW & QLD is much larger than Perth, Horbart, Darwin (akthought townsville say they will play there) Adelaide combined, so by capturing the regional centres which neither the NRL or AFL will put teams in will provide a massive base of support in the fastest growing parts of Australia, that is regional NSW & QLD is a very clever.
Also the players in the first team squad play in some of the top European teams, like Liverpool, AC Milan, Newcastle (England not to confuse with Scum just north of us), This gets heaps of cred, and that so far at least the Socceroos are never in drunken brawls whereas all the other codes have various degrees of mis behaviour.
So believe me mate in national terms, its the Soccroos first especially in WCQ. Put as simple as I can Frank has made football the second code supporters of other codes follow thus everyone supports the Socceroos. Also the closness of the matches and thje quality of the first team have a lot to do with it.
Socceroo/ Mariner / Whangarei
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Please do not take this the wrong way and I am not wishing to insult............ but to show how the landscrape has changed in OZ making the Socceroos would be every boys & girls dream, cricket then, and a few union & League. My feeling is in NZ an All Black is still the player boys dream of not an All White. So these young men from all clubs will have learnt a lot and I think as I said before will raise their standard and by that the league's standard next season.
I wouldn't go that far. Not yet. Football is still just behind the NRL and a long long way behind AFL. Definately agree about the All Whites v All Blacks thing but it's always going to be like that. If we somehow qualify for a world cup sooner rather than later - it would help.
always is a long time , Mr Nostrodamus
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Hey, tigers, don't be so rough on poor, old valeo for making outlandish predictions. 
He's probably exhausted from lugging his crystal ball around.
Imagine if he had two balls? 
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Valeo I am not comparing A-League to NRL or AFL teams. Both NRL & AFL wins by a long way no question. But at national level its the Socceroos.
Yeah, but that is because the AFL and NRL teams don't have international sides. (well, the League does but no one really takes notice of it)
I was here last year when the Socceroos were in the midst of the World Cup and it was just amazing. Can't wait to see something like that again.
I wouldn't go that far. Not yet. Football is still just behind the NRL and a long long way behind AFL. Definately agree about the All Whites v All Blacks thing but it's always going to be like that. If we somehow qualify for a world cup sooner rather than later - it would help.
always is a long time , Mr Nostrodamus
How this was done was very clever by Frank Lowy, he said a number of times in Hal 1 & 2, you can have two teams, you can support Parramattam or Geelong and a football team as well. Then taking the game to a summer time zone (or actually keeping it there) he invited people to come and see.
The first stage of the plan in essence is to make football the number two sport in all states. Given NRL & AFL are stated based then football becomes the national sport and that stage of the plan is almost complete. The next stage is to capture regional Australia and not take on either the AFL & NRL in the capital cities in a big way. This is now in full flow with the gold coast, townsville, to add to the MIGHTY MARINERS , Scum, and the NIx's, then Woolingong. You see regional Australia in NSW & QLD is much larger than Perth, Horbart, Darwin (akthought townsville say they will play there) Adelaide combined, so by capturing the regional centres which neither the NRL or AFL will put teams in will provide a massive base of support in the fastest growing parts of Australia, that is regional NSW & QLD is a very clever.
Also the players in the first team squad play in some of the top European teams, like Liverpool, AC Milan, Newcastle (England not to confuse with Scum just north of us), This gets heaps of cred, and that so far at least the Socceroos are never in drunken brawls whereas all the other codes have various degrees of mis behaviour.
So believe me mate in national terms, its the Soccroos first especially in WCQ. Put as simple as I can Frank has made football the second code supporters of other codes follow thus everyone supports the Socceroos. Also the closness of the matches and thje quality of the first team have a lot to do with it.
[/QUOTE]Yeah, but that is because the AFL and NRL teams don't have international sides. (well, the League does but no one really takes notice of it)
I was here last year when the Socceroos were in the midst of the World Cup and it was just amazing. Can't wait to see something like that again.
[QUOTE=Midfielder]
Please do not
take this the wrong way and I am not wishing to insult............ but
to show how the landscrape has changed in OZ making the Socceroos would
be every boys & girls dream, cricket then, and a few union &
League. My feeling is in NZ an All Black is still the player boys dream
of not an All White. So these young men from all clubs will have learnt
a lot and I think as I said before will raise their standard and by
that the league's standard next season.
I wouldn't go that far. Not yet. Football is still just behind the NRL and a long long way behind AFL. Definately agree about the All Whites v All Blacks thing but it's always going to be like that. If we somehow qualify for a world cup sooner rather than later - it would help.
always is a long time , Mr Nostrodamus
Well, in my lifetime - which is all I care about.
Aussie is about 20 years ahead football wise. Football might match it - who knows - but it'll never overtake it. (especially if morons keep running NZF) Just like football will never 'overtake' AFL in Victoria.valeo2008-02-06 12:01:41
a.haak
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[/QUOTE]
(from valeo) Aussie is about 20 years ahead football wise. Football might match it - who knows - but it'll never overtake it. (especially if morons keep running NZF).
[/QUOTE]
(from valeo) Aussie is about 20 years ahead football wise. Football might match it - who knows - but it'll never overtake it. (especially if morons keep running NZF).
[/QUOTE]
I think 20 years is pessimistic, but we could shorten that gap with some serious Govt money and support (assuming we first dump the current morons at NZF - agree with that, valeo).
Imagine the enormous publicity for NZ if we could get an All Whites team through to a World Cup?
Maybe Helen is too big a league fan to see the obvious, but someone should quiz John Key to see if he'd get behind the Kiwi "beautiful game".
(There is an election looming. Good time to wring a few promises out of our leaders.)
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[/QUOTE]
Imagine the enormous publicity for NZ if we could get an All Whites team through to a World Cup?
Maybe Helen is too big a league fan to see the obvious, but someone should quiz John Key to see if he'd get behind the Kiwi "beautiful game".
(There is an election looming. Good time to wring a few promises out of our leaders.)
it seems that the Aussie politicians have a far clearer idea of the impact of football throughout the world than any of our lot do
be interested to hear of any current or future NZ politicos who have ever made a positive public statement about football - i can't recall any -but would love to be corrected on that belief
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and now Craig Moore has axed himself. Seems a strange time to do it.
Oi Oi Edgecumbe... lets have a clean sheet
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Not really. Playing in the A-League means it's almost impossible to keep yourself fit in the off season - and it's a huge off season - and he probably feels like once he gets out of that rhythm he wont be able to get back into it.
a.haak
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