Give credit where it's due - Oceania wants to sink visa rule!!
THE Oceania Football Confederation wants Football Federation Australia to relax visa restrictions on Pacific Island players as a precursor to organising its own team in the A-League.
As the FFA starts laying the foundations for expanding the eight-team competition by up to six teams, the OFC hasn't forgotten chairman Frank Lowy's invitation to bid for an A-League licence when he attended a charity match in Noumea two months ago. The OFC is likely to take the process a step further by setting up a steering committee at its next board meeting in early October. Pacific Pride FC is believed to be the working title of the proposed franchise.
While the FFA has made clear its priority is to find new Australian-based teams, the OFC is happy to adopt a patient approach to joining the competition. Part of the reason is the confederation's own future within FIFA remains in a permanent state of uncertainty - a situation underlined by FIFA president Sepp Blatter when he visited Sydney in late May.
"We do need to look at the structures of FIFA, but it's not only Oceania because there are also terrible discrepancies [scorelines] in other confederations," Blatter said at the time. "We have to tackle this issue eventually, but not for the time being. We cannot do it."
In the meantime, the 11-nation OFC continues to focus heavily on player development, but the confederation believes it is being hindered by the lack of opportunities in the region's only professional competition.
While there were a smattering of Polynesian and Melanesian players in the old NSL, there are no islanders in the A-League - not even at Wellington Phoenix, which is within the OFC's borders. When the FFA left Oceania to join Asia two years ago, it signed a Co-Operation Agreement with the OFC, and as part of that arrangement the OFC wants its players exempt from the A-League's four-import quota.
"Eventually we would like to have our own franchise in Oceania, but for the time being we need to get our players competing at a higher level," OFC general secretary Tai Nicholas said. "We've started talking to the FFA about it, and we're hopeful they'll change the rules and put Oceania players in a special category. Let's face it, when you're competing with players from Europe and South America for an import spot, it doesn't make it easy. We believe there are at least six or seven players good enough for the A-League, but they're not getting an opportunity."
The OFC has an unlikely ally in Gold Coast United coach Miron Bleiberg, who is keen to have a sprinkling of Oceania players in his squad when the club joins the A-League next year.
"If there was any type of concessions, I would be more than happy to have some of them because they bring something different to the table, they're the type of players who excite the crowd," Bleiberg said.
"But if they count as a visa player, because of their lack of experience at a high level, because they lack tactical knowledge, it prevents you from taking them. I would like us to give them a chance. As good neighbours and because we used to be part of the OFC, I think we owe it to them to help."
Ultimately, the OFC would have its destiny in its own hands if it creates an A-League franchise, and Nicholas insists it's not a pipedream. Using the OFC headquarters in Auckland as a base, the team would play games next door at Mount Smart Stadium, and take some fixtures to upgraded stadiums in Ba (Fiji), Honiara (Solomon Islands), Port Moresby (PNG) and Noumea (New Caledonia)
"We're an organisation which represents 11 million people, and we have almost one million registered players. That's a solid foundation," Nicholas said.
Give credit where it's due - Ocerania wants to sink visa rule.
However we do have this funny custom of not capitalising every first letter of every word.... You should try it sometime.