Phoenix as a "Selling Club"

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/a-league/115716811/how-bayern-munich-star-sarpreet-singh-is-shaping-wellington-phoenixs-new-identity

This is an interesting article.  I personally think that it is a bit convenient to say this was always a plane when until last year we really never employed a coach with any intention of playing guys from our own academy.  I do worry that the Phoenix seem to jump from one strategy to the next quite quickly, and it's unlikely we will be getting $1m fees every year.  

It's also unclear as yet whether the club can execute this strategy while also being competitive on the pitch.  

All I would say is if this is the long-term strategy, we are going to need more off field football nouse, because right from the top of the club to the bottom it needs to be aligned.  Every coach has to know and understand that the job is to play players from the academy and I do wonder whether we can get coaches to buy into that when it may mean that on field performances suffer.

Interesting stuff. A bit too much fluffing over the Singh thing which may be a one in ten year thing. If there is more to come then all good. Presently the Piscopo signing is in the red and may remain that way. 

You could debate this strategy til the cows come home.

Scenario - Cacace has a great few months to start A League season. Come late December Nix, are right in finals mix. It's last year of Cacace's contract. An offer of Euros500k comes in from a lower table Serie A club.

What do the Nix do?

Good news is that Academy is working well (Sam Wilkinson sounds a great pickup as well), plenty of young Kiwis are getting a chance, and long term future of the club looks almost certain

Agree re the muddled vision/strategy but hopeful this (latest) one is because for the first time since Welnix got their feet under the desk it's beginning to look like there's a long term future for the club - and they can build strategies accordingly.

Do they have the people in place to execute these strategies currently? Of course not; but I have no doubt those at the top table have the nouse to do so, as they've proven in other endeavours - and I look forward to it. 

Is football/sport different? Yeah, sure it is - it's unique, just like every other organisation and environment. And (just like every other organisation) it's a case of identifying and acquiring the resources you need to achieve your outcomes (and/or implement your strategies)... so here's hoping.

Although it seems to be working well at the Nix, tThere is really no guarantee that young players come through to the elite level. Many child prodigies fade away......

They've stated that this was the strategy since they started the academy, that was one of the reasons they hired Ernie because of his background in the Victorian Institute of sport. The only reason they haven't been executing it well IMO is because they've had to balance the year on year metric growth and short term survival with long term investment. You can't have a strategy to build a team over a few seasons if you need results immediately. The license and metric situation has led to a couple of decisions which in hindsight seem a little dubious or rash because the club was hunting for a quick fix.

My concern is that Piscopo hasn't even played a game yet and they've already publicly earmarked him as an example of this "selling club" strategy. There's a lot of water to pass under the bridge before the Phoenix can start thinking about a tangible return on investment, and there's always the chance the player either won't live up to expectations, or will say sod this after a season and demand a return to Australia. As long as transfer fees can't be exchanged between A-League clubs, the real power will always lie with the player in these scenarios (it really is an outdated ruling). Someone please correct me if this rule is no longer in place.

Not at all saying that Piscopo will be a flop or demand a move to Aussie after a year, but I just thought it was interesting they've come out right from the off and said they signed him as someone they can make a return on in the future. Puts a bit of extra pressure on the player.

The owners do not owe Wellington the existence of a football club. If not enough people turn up for the club to be sustainable, then they need alt commercial models.

Welnix have made a huge commitment to the academy, the associated facilities and have employed top coaches. And they started doing so from day one.

This has clearly always been their intention.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/9681714/Ernie-Merrick...

https://www.wellingtonphoenix.com/news/new-zealand...

https://www.wellingtonphoenix.com/news/new-coach-p...

Both Waine and Carcace turned down overseas offers after the u20 World Cup - there is a demand for our players already.

Even if we do not get large fees upfront, sell on's etc and training payments will add to the bottom line if these players move on.

The club would have also made money on Boyd for the 3 or 4 years he was at the Nix. Not huge money, but 6 figures. Also, if the Mexican u17 captain goes, after the WC as expected we will get a good portion out of that too as he was with us for 3 or 4 years. 

There is money coming in, poised to come in. It just hasn't had the same media interest.

using trust funding has provided a motive to how they have set up

If we can sell only 1 or 2 young lads a season that would work fine. We sold Singh this season then possibly Cacace next and Waine the one after, if this happens I see no problem. Just one playing leaving meaning only one player has to be replaced rather than selling 4 or 5 and having to replace all of them. This could work well.

I suspect that you're vastly overrating the amounts involved through training compensation and solidarity mechanisms. Doubt that it got anywhere near six figures for Boyd.

Waine turned down overseas offers?

Mexican kid = Eugenio Pizzuto, for those who are wondering

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/world-game/115080198/wellington-schoolboy-eugenio-pizzuto-now-one-of-mexicos-brightest-football-prospects

(PS, remember this name because he's gonna be a big deal)

Given that he was never registered with the club, they won't be getting any training compensation/solidarity payments for him, I wouldn't think.

long way off If they got any solidarity payment for Boyd it would likely have been in the region of $10-$20k

He was here for four years, so that's about 2% of the fee, plus they may have got some training compensation money for him. Either way, unlikely it would've been more than $50-60k max.

Cacace, McCowatt, Waine, Piscopo - even if just one sells every few years it will be a source of money that we haven't really had before, with a handful of exceptions. We got good money for Singh, we have a young, talented crop of players for the next few years, and one of the best academies in the league. Barring a takeover we'll never compete financially with clubs like the Vuck or Smurfs, but I can't see a better way forward for us than aiming for this. 

People mention that this is the Mariners plan and look how shark they're going, but they haven't really produced any talent to sell for a while, whereas we have. They used to - during their most successful period in the league, between 2008 and 2013 CCM sold six players (Jedinak, Amini, Wilkinson, Griffiths, Rogic, and Ibini) for a combined $4.3M, with Griffiths the highest fee at $1.3M and Amini the lowest at $400k. Through those years they had a number of smaller transfers too, like Matty Ryan and Matt Simon selling for under $200k. They then sold Sainsbury and Duke in 2014 and 2015 for $200k each but since then there's been nothing. Four years of terrible A-League campaigns and no star players, because they have stopped producing good young talent - They themselves aren't even "doing a central coast" anymore. Our academy is miles better than theirs - if we keep up the stream of talent that our academy system is starting to pump out, steal the cream of the rest of New Zealand's youth football talent like McCowatt and keep an eye on (hopefully) savvy pick-ups like Piscopo, I can't see why it would be a bad route to go down, nor how we could end up like the mariners. 

Imagine they'd get good fees from Ryan transfers too.

There's heaps of clubs around the world trying to do this and as much as anyone tries to say otherwise, a large part of whether it's successful comes down to pure luck. Then it's scouting, coaching, and facilities that make up the difference. One advantage we have is if we scout well enough we should be able to get pretty much any promising youngster from across the country. Imagine if the likes of Wood or Thomas had been signed up as teenagers. Even if you take the Sydney or Melbourne sides as a comparison they have the same population but two clubs in the city competing for players, not to mention all the other Aussie clubs. In Aussie there's a pro club per 2.7m people, we have 4.7m to draw from. 

Another aspect I think we should explore is the pathway for Oceania players. We could have sold Krishna for a profit a couple of seasons ago if we wanted, and imagine if we'd signed him a few years earlier. This is why I think we should sign Semmy. There's such an element of risk with imports anyway so I reckon having one slot dedicated to developing island talent would be worth it. Especially if they increase the foreign quota.

So everyone wants Wellington to be a development club and not a champ contender? I really don't like the wooden spoon and either would the crowds.

Developing players means we're a champion contending club. We get more money by selling players to spend in the rest of the squad and we get good players at a lower cost that we develop ourselves.

Having players like Singh and Cacace really hurts us, what we need is to focus on overpaid (as we usually need to pay a premium to get them to Wellington) recycled A-League players to take us to Victory.

Seriously though, what we need is both to some degree, a focus on (Kiwi) youth development, with opportunities for the best of them to prove themselves in the senior football, alongside a few quality imports, and a few A League veterans.

I think the outlook of the phoenix is pretty spot on right about now. A good blend of promising young kiwi's, experienced Aussies and strong visa players. 

Am happy with our emphasis on youth atm.

we get it, please stop

I think a selling off club is an insult to what the nix are trying to do, every club wants to be the best but I think the Phoenix have accepted the environment we are in, ie NZ team, lack of corporate money being based in NZ and in the A-league. A bit of a different environment compared to the biggest teams in their leagues around the world where money is easily accessable to buy any talent they want.

If a top dutch club like Ajax can't keep hold of its players after a successful Champions League campaign because of the never ending money they compete against then the Phoenix have learn't a valuable lesson far quicker than most clubs in their entire existence.

Developing talent might be seen as less risky compared way to fill the player stocks compared with hauling a players from the other side of the world.

That may be true, but the club was also never really set up that way. We've let players go through the academy who've never been played at first team level - look at McGarry and Boyd. Rufer had to trial last year, Cacace earned his spot and Singh was dropped by seasons end. I don't really think there's been an actual plan from top to bottom to develop players, bring them into the team and then see them on. I worry that we get one good fee for a once in ten year player and suddenly that's our strategy for the club. 

It can work better for us as it's harder for other clubs to poach our players and there will probably be transfer fees between clubs in the future too

But the article specifically says that with our young squad results may suffer...can you say that selling Singh has improved our team? It clearly can work, I just hope theres a real top to bottom strategy worked out here cause we are definitely not going to get $1m fees very often

I may have this wrong but dont McCowatt and Cacace only have a one year contract? IMO you need to take a punt on some of these kids and offer them a longer term. Cacace will be gone next season IMO. Should sign him up for 3 years....we might get some transfer money.

I always knew that some day, with the right coaching structures operating, that NZ would could produce talented young footballers. Absolutely no reason why young kiwi athletes cant be as good as anyone else globally when it come to football. The raw material is certainly here.

Cant praise Welnix enough for what they have done with the Academy. If we get a steady stream of young kiwis coming through to the Nix, great. If every so often we can pick up a bit of transfer cash selling players overseas even better. Singh was probably a once in a generation transfer...Europe is a hard sell,  but A-League clubs have done OK selling into Asian leagues.

Personally, I think that's more a reflection of the fact that our past two coaches were control freaks by nature who completely ran football operations at the top of the playing structure and were forced, because of past poor performance, to completely focus on turning around the fortunes of the first team.

Greenacre, Temple, Hedge (and others) have consistently done a lot of great work outside of the first team squad for a long time with little in the way of acknowledgement or inclusion from the man in charge of the first team