Modernise or perish, warns Berger

A topic sometimes discussed on this site .... sometimes about the Nix's themselves ie play ugly for results or play with style...

According to Hans Berger Football in Australia needs to Modernise or perish very strong words.. two links first the article and second a link to the new Australian ... National Football Curriculum 

The article http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/news/1167905/Modernise-or-perish,-warns-Berger

National Football Curriculum  http://www.footballaustralia.com.au/nationalcurriculum

Australian football needs to adopt a modern possession game at all levels if it is to compete with the world's big guns, national technical director Han Berger warned.

Berger was speaking at Football Federation Australia headquarters after he released the second edition of the football curriculum that is designed to take Australia to the next level of the world game.

"We need a shift in our culture and mentality and we must have a fundamental transformation to make it happen," Berger said.

"Australia will only become a major football country if it adopts a modern patient approach, which in my opinion should be based on a 4-3-3 style.

"This system should help us develop players consistently to make Australia competitive.

"This way we won't need to rely on a golden generation like that of 2006.

"The patient possession game is not in the Australian psyche but the fact of the matter is that it should be and we should look at the big picture and at the top level.

"It is impossible to think that you can be regularly successful with a physical and direct playing style.

"Last season Celtic beat Barcelona in the Champions League. Yes, you can beat some big team in a one-off.

"In one game anything is possible.

"But on a consistent basis the direct style is not the way to go.

"Modern, top-level football has moved away from that and we need to follow."

Berger said he was pleased to note that several A-League clubs had already adapted to the needs of the modern game but the same could not be said about the attitude in the lower levels.

"To change that we have chosen a top-down approach for our top coaches and now we are trying to start a bottom-up approach based on communication with grassroots, reaching out to them," he said.

"The idea is to try to convince coaches, players and parents why this makes sense.

"At grassroots level I'm afraid it is generally still very much a win-at-all-cost physical mentality.

"That's the big challenge we face. These things take time and don't happen overnight but I am convinced that Australia will see results from this."

Australia's Socceroos are at the crossroads, having qualified for their third straight FIFA World Cup albeit with a rapidly ageing team.

Berger, who will relinquish his post after the World Cup in Brazil, said that Australia as in a delicate situation in terms of its national team priorities.

"The expectation level regarding the Socceroos is high," Berger siaid.

"When they qualified in 2006 the whole country went crazy, in 2010 it was becoming a bit normal and now it is completely normal.

"Fans expect them to qualify every time, so if the Socceroos fail to reach the finals it would be a disappointment.

"But we did not do it easy this time and to me that was a signal that we have to put in a structured approach that would enable us to consistently develop a level of good players.

"It is difficult situation for coaches because every coach who goes to a World Cup wants to perform as well as they can.

"We are currently in a transition phase between generations and that is always very difficult.

"So it is up to Holger Osieck to find the right balance and I think it is very difficult for any federation to tell a coach 'look, this is what you have to do'."

So has the time come for FFA to look ahead long-term and appoint a coach who would be under no pressure or obligation to help the Socceroos qualify for a major tournament or two?

"That's a philosophical discussion," Berger said.

"We are already doing that with our under-age teams.

"But with the national team it is much more complicated."

TL;DR?

Too long; didn't read. It means 'do you have a very short summary for those of us not wanting to read that'. An example of a TL;DR for Lord of the Rings might be "some little guy chose to take this ring to a mountain to be destroyed to kill the forces of evil in his homeland"

Skim read. 

Basically everyone needs to start playing like Barcelona or the league and australian football is going to perish 

Jeff V

Thanks for explaining the TL;DR? .... and as someone else posted its not Dutch, Bacca, German what's next...

It's above creating a national understanding and development of football... it has always been about technical development and its 4 3 3 .. and various formations areound 4 3 3... 

Yonks ago maybe Hal 1 but maybe Hal 2 .. it was decided the best way to maintain crowds and get folk to watch on TV was to explain the game to them.... while we are the most played game in players at park level there was almost no understanding of much of the game and its technical aspects which were deemed important to convert the soccer mums and dads to viewers and match attenders ... thus started a huge technical war ... forcing increases in coaching standards and pushing for not playing ugly .. massive resistance and arguments at the start but largely agreed today ...  

This document is how to take the technical aspects of the game to the park teams which is seen as the key in future ratings and crowds... much has been done ... 

To keep this post short will leave it their but post what has been done in the next post and you can ignore if it is to large so can apply your TL:DR 

AS promised some of what has been done copied mostly from an article on the Roar... as I said the documentation of a change in how football is understood and developed.... BTW if you think this is long the docuement itsllf is 300 pages long..  

Frank Lowy said in 2004 the development of a national domestic competition was essential. What was, and still is, missing is football knowledge at park levels. Many issues are affected by this, from keeping good players to people watching and understanding football.

FFA understood that to get people to watch and stay in the game, technical standards needed to be improved and explained.

Football’s management was forced to take a long hard look at itself and decide how to grow the game. Technical improvement programs were expanded.

The quality of football and the understanding of how to play are being spread.

Football has achieved this on very small budgets. From a very strong position in 2003 in terms of player numbers to today when we can’t get enough fields.

Essentially, FFA spend over a third of its money on these technical junior programs – not marketing, not player salaries.

The payoff is only now starting to come. Each A-League team today has a number of junior players coming out of these programs.

Another goal was to stop players aged 12 to 16 from leaving the sport. Football wanted to keep its best.

The following was undertaken, to both keep players and spread technical knowledge:

• Establishment of a youth league team for each A-League club.
• Establishments of national player identification programs, hopefully taking out bias in player selection.
• Establishment of national training systems so that players coming through the system they decent training.
• Identification of the 60 best junior players in Australia between 12 and 16 and then developing a coaching system for these players.
• Establishment of a national under-15 side.
• Establishment of state under-15 sides.
• Development of the small-sided no score, skill games for all competitions under 10; thus, in under-10 and under park games, no score is kept and player numbers are reduced and are on small fields, to give kids more time on the park. This was seen as being needed to improve quality in later years.

The result was that considerably more players stayed, and women’s football exploded in numbers such that netball is starting to get worried about the drain of players to football.

Today, according to the CSIRO, football has close to 900,000 registered winter park players.

The fractured nature of our structure was another major issue.

The FFA has created a state-based National Premier League across the country with promotion and regulation, meaning the tier below the A-League is structured, with each team required to have a technical director qualified to a certain FIFA level.

While this may take some money away from the A-League, it is seen as being critical in creating a pool of players and creates over 100 academies around the country.

Plus, it gives players reasons to stay in football.

The FFA Cup, with over 800 park teams invited to play and broadcasters and sponsors being involved, again brings in the park teams into the national setup to feel a part of the family.

Other developments include the establishment of a National Indigenous Kids academy, higher technical qualifications being required by all coaches, and massive inroads into the private school system, with schools creating football academies akin to what they have developed in rugby.

Football has spent over a third of its revenue on developing technical skills at lower levels, and is planning to now involve every single park team in Australia with the A-League.

To grow in the future, free-to-air coverage was increased. It came with a reduction to revenue. However, it is seen as necessary to grow the game and spread more technical knowledge.

In four years’ time, football will have over a million registered park players, with over one hundred academies, 800 park teams involved in a national competition and a national second tier competition with promotion and regulation.

Remember the howls when we lost two teams from 12 to 10 and the clubs demanded more money? FFA held firm and let the competition shrink, and kept putting more of their funds into junior development than the A-League.

The investment in juniors today represents maybe 25 percent of the players in the A-League; they are young, skilful, and will bring crowds.

For the junior football - how is this different from NZF's Whole of Football?

Just adding this from the SMH .... re how important this is seen in Australia...

Roadmap plots Socceroos path to top

If a Socceroos team ever wins the World Cup, historians will pinpoint the day back in 2013 when an online e-book was launched, aimed at reshaping the style and culture of football in Australia.

Around midday on Friday, Football Federation Australia released The National Football Curriculum - The Roadmap To International Success, which national technical director Han Berger described as his legacy, a comprehensive blueprint the Dutchman is confident will transform the way the game is played and coached from grassroots upwards, hopefully eventually placing Australia among the world's football powers.

Based on years of research and analysis, the free resource - which Berger believes may be unique in the world - is aimed at players, coaches and parents and provides detailed practical lessons on training, coaching and football philosophies.

It offers age-appropriate drills and model sessions directed towards building a style of possession-based, pro-active football, rather than relying on physicality and mental strength.

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''At this moment [the patient possession-style game] is not really in the Australian psyche,'' Berger said. ''The simple fact of the matter is that, at the top level, it's impossible to think you can ever be successful consistently with a physical direct playing style. In a one-off, everything is still fortunately possible in football. But on a consistent basis, the direct physical playing style is not the way to go. Modern top level football has moved away from that.''

Berger revealed that Guus Hiddink's former assistant, A-League-winning coach Graham Arnold, warned shortly after the 2006 World Cup there was not a sufficient succession plan. Pim Verbeek repeated the warning when he left in 2010.

Berger, who joined FFA in 2009, said when things were going well, it was sometimes hard to look to the future. ''People and organisations tend to take things for granted,'' he said. ''Then suddenly the coin starts dropping when things go less well.''

In recent years, despite qualifying for the 2014 World Cup, the Socceroos' rank has fallen from the 20s to the 50s. The so-called ''Golden Generation'' of players who carried the team to relative success throughout the mid and late 2000s is breaking up and cracks are appearing. No longer can Australia simply hope that another good group of players comes together.

The building blocks have to be laid. In 2009, the first edition of the curriculum was released but it dealt mainly with the over-riding philosophies required to implement a new way of playing football.

It was focused on the top down and some of the results have filtered through to A-League and national junior sides. Berger highlighted the under-20 team as having shown encouraging signs at the Under-20 World Cup in Turkey in June.

This edition is a practical resource, which will be implemented at future A-League club elite academies and national premier league clubs. It is especially aimed at the foundation level.

''When it starts there, I'm convinced we'll see the results of that,'' Berger said.

The main culture change will centre around changing the win-at-all-costs mentality in junior football, which Berger explained led to booting the ball upfield and scrapping for possession. That approach emphasised physicality, not technicality.

It also had the effect of alienating smaller children. He said he wanted young players to be encouraged to be creative and clever with the ball, rather than just trying to get the ball to the goal as quickly as possible.

''At grassroots level it's still very much a winning at all costs mentality, a direct physical type of game,'' he said. ''That's the big challenge now, to convince the coaches, the players and the parents that that's not the right way to go.''

Implementing such a change will take much more than publishing a book, apps and videos. It will take time and patience. In Japan, a 50-year plan was launched in the 1980s. In Germany, it took a decade.

''That is the minimum,'' Berger said. ''So, you have to think in decades. That's a difficult selling point because people tend to look at results next year, or changes next year, they want it to be tangible and visible. But those processes do not happen overnight.

''To really make it happen … there needs to be a shift and change in culture and mentality. The success [of the curriculum] stands or falls with how much, how deeply, it will be embraced.''

If it is embraced properly, Berger is convinced the long-term approach will develop generations of players to take Australia to the top levels of the game.

''We're three or four years into it. We've only touched the surface. We've only worked top down. Now we have to start putting our energy in working bottom up. Only if you have a broad and strong foundation, your summit will be of top quality as we

Can you summarise such posts and add what you think about it, then just a link to the page? That way we can see your insight and summary, then decide whether we want to read the article. 

Because I'll be honest, I tend to not read a lot of what you post, which is unfortunate because am sure a lot of it is interesting. 

Hi Midfielder. Bergers blueprint is in principle very similar to NZF's Whole of Football plan, which has been introduced progressively since about 2009/10. The key difference in approach between FFA and NZF is that the kiwis went for bottom up/grassroots from the start. So the parents of 4-10 year olds would be familiar with SSG/ focus on developing technical skills base at their local clubs. Whereas senior clubs are still playing hoofball (recent Chatham cup final being just one such example). The exciting thing is that there are some kids beginning to come through the system - whose coaching from a young age has been built on a technical, possession, passing, creative base. Regional Federation Talent Centres (along with private academies) also have a good proportion of these kids playing Futsal which complements the goal of producing creative, technical players who have skill base that ensbles them to compete at the highest levels. The next level of the player pyramid - National Talent Centres- over the next 5 years will throw up some very good young kiwi footballers. The challenge will be for senior clubs to integrate these players and for national age group coaches to harness the talent in the build up to tournament play. One day more kiwis will appreciate good football that is hopefully winning football, because they've been educated as to what good football actually is.

went to a coach course in Canberra and the first thing to notice was the similarity between WOF and the newer Aussie scheme. 

bottom up works best. When we can show the younger players are far more adept and useful than the last of the "anti-change" brigade should quiten down a little. 

...or if you're 4yrs old and in the same room as Rolf Harris!!!