The latest Windows 10 update screws up my taskbar - Bulleen Lions 2 South Melbourne 2

Sometimes after games like this you think that was two points lost. Well, this time it was a point salvaged. Turning up to play an hour into the game, and not having a shot on target until probably about seventy minutes in is not the best way to go about the business of securing top spot in your own right.

But we should first acknowledge the elephant in the room - that whatever preparation the club did on synthetic pitches in the week leading up to this game, it was all for nothing. No player wearing a blue shirt had any idea what they were doing out there, with the possible exception of Milos Lujic who was provided such dire service that I am happy for him to have shown the ample frustration he did last night.

Our players who had destroyed their opponents in the first few weeks with good overlapping, hard pressing and decisive movement, could barely control the ball at their feet. Some onlookers mentioned how fast the ball moved along the ground, but there was also the way ball would just stall when it hit the ground from a lobbed or chipped pass. This meant that Bulleen's long balls along the wings, instead of running out of play, ended up sitting perfectly for players like Sami Nour and Shayan Alinejad to run on to.

Tactically, too, we were all over the shop. Lujic by himself surrounded by opponents, while our wingers simultaneously failed to get forward and got caught out on the counter by the speedy Bulleen forwards. And while one may lament getting beaten on one wing, shouldn't someone be marking the opponent on the opposite wing?

The midfield was a shambles, positions becoming meaningless not in a good, Total Football way but instead in a 'we are lost' kind of way. Now maybe the Peoples' Champ had been given free reign by Chris Taylor to drift into the middle, but all it did was add to the confusion of everyone around him. The Peoples' Champ was also in one of his 'bad' moods, sulking and refusing to track back.

Our best player by a long way was Nikola Roganovic, who pulled off several good saves. But even he was prone to making errors, giving away the ball cheaply from a kick up the field which lead to Bulleen's first goal, and then making an avoidable mistake in the second half which should have led to another Bulleen goal - if not for his own efforts to make up for the aforementioned error.

Switching to what seemed like a three man back line during the second half, with Matthew Foschini at right back, seemed to change things up a bit, though Bulleen also paid the price for going into their shell too much trying to protect their lead instead of going for a third goal. Mathew Theodore came on for Iqi Jawadi at half time, and managed to score, but as much as I like Theodore, is it time perhaps to be blooding Andy Kecojevic into that attacking mid role, even if as a sub? I suppose you can give Taylor the benefit of the doubt in that in the moment of need, he would turn to the experienced player rather than the still young Kecojevic, but at some point Andy's going to have get a run in his preferred position in a situation with more responsibility than an early round Dockerty Cup game.

But credit to the team last night that they were able to snatch a result from such a poor showing. With our entry into the cup coming up this week, we will see some different and hitherto underused players - including Chris Irwin, Leigh Minopoulos (who played a full match in the under 20s last night), or even visa player Philzgerald Mbaka who also played in the 20s?

Next game - updated
As noted above somewhat obliquely, for our first FFA Cup tie for 2016 we've been drawn against Keysborough. We will be playing as the first part of a double-header out at John Cain Memorial Reserve, this Saturday. Our game will kick off at 12:15PM, while the Northcote vs St Albans game will kick off at 3:00PM.

Entry for South members is free prior to 1:00PM. I'm glad that we've avoided some awful trip to the south-east, as well as get the bonus of seeing what is likely to be one of the better games of this round of the cup, if one chooses to do so. (I will in all likelihood be choosing to do so).

AGM news
Those of you who were financial members of the club last year will be pleased to know that the club's financial statements for the 2014/2015 financial year are now available upon request from the club.

I gripe, therefore I am
Yes, yes, it was an excellent crowd of about 2000, maybe more, but I maintain that Monday night football is awful, especially when it means I get home at midnight.

Australian Pedestrianism in the 21st Century (aka whinge, whinge, whinge your bus, 'gently' down the stream badly kept roads)
So, after having my one plausible avenue of getting a lift to the Veneto Club fall through - not that I'm blaming anybody, except for whoever was daft enough to schedule a game for 8:30 on a Monday night - it was decided that since we must go to the Veneto Club come hell or high water, that we would risk taking public transport.

Now when I mentioned the atrocious public transport access to the Veneto Club to a sort of university associate during the week leading up to this fixture, he said that I was mistaken about the poverty of public transport options to 191 Bulleen Road, and that I could travel on a bus that would lead me to the Veneto Club's front door.

See those red lines? Those are public transport routes. See that white blob inside the large green space? That's the Veneto Club. Now remember that my 'friend' had said that there was public transport which stopped right outside the ground. Rubbish. The bus (on whichever of the routes on the southern part of the map you may choose) stops a good kilometre away from the Veneto Club as the crow flies.

Oh, and what a bus trip up there. Deciding to catch the 200 mostly out of noble ignorance - it said Bulleen on the front of the bus, and I had an idea it would end up as close as we could possibly hope for to the Veneto Club entrance - we made the meandering journey through some suburbs I suppose you'd call them, but good luck noticing any of that on some of the most appalling roads I've had the pleasure of travelling on which threatened to smash apart what was left of my teeth.

This being the Middle (North-) East however, where the locals despise not only public transport, but seemingly also footpaths and anybody who may choose or simply not be able to use a motor vehicle, the one kilometre trek should have come with a pair of complimentary hiking boots and a trekking pole. Wandering through what locals apparently call 'The Manno', some sort of garishly decorated hotel and reception centre, we trudged over a lawn that had more potholes than Lakeside after an athletics meet.

Then it was time to make a decision - cross to the western side of Bulleen Road where there appeared to be no footpath, or continue up the eastern side past Marcellin College, where there was at least a gravel path, but probably no pedestrian friendly way of crossing over to the Veneto Club, what with there being a massive grass trench in the middle of the road. Deciding on the gravel path, we eventually crossed over relatively safely, all while I spent the time cursing the whole experience and those responsible for it.

The return trip was mostly worse. Standing at the gate waiting for some I'm sure obvious to everyone gap in the traffic in order to stand on a tiny island of concrete not intended for pedestrians only to repeat that again to get across the other two lanes while hoping that the delays wouldn't lead to missing the bus out of this pleb-hating middle class cesspool of bilious class war hate, was a wonderful experience.

Deciding to jaywalk across the Eastern Freeway was a good idea, because my taxes* paid for that road, and why should I have to give in to the tyranny of the automobile and wait forever for the little green man to tell me when to cross - across three different sets of pedestrian lights - when there was ample opportunity to do so. And this is from someone who shows incredible patience for the little green man to show himself when crossing Ballarat Road at Victoria University.

Anyway, this time we took the first bus on offer, which was the 905 back to the city, which was faster and more comfortable than the 200. Having said that, overall it was a rotten experience which not even the availability of chinotto at the ground could save.

*or somebody's taxes

'Clubs like South Melbourne'
Always nice to be at the forefront of David Gallop's mind.

“FFA Cup, the creation of NPL... all of these things are part of closing the gap between the A-League and the semi-professional tier and we’re well aware that the leading NPL clubs – indeed clubs like South Melbourne in Viectoria – are keen to keep promotion and relegation on the agenda,” he said.

Even better, in another article about promotion and relegation, the photo used was one of South Melbourne. OK, it was from our magnificent (wait, that's not the right word...) FFA Cup appearance, but just be glad that once again we have managed to usurp the role of being the public face of a movement that we had generally tried to avoid being the public face of. Like the NPL Victoria protestations, we weren't particularly interested in promotion and relegation while we thought we had other ways of getting out of this pee pee soaked heck-hole. It's almost like we're the Hilary Clinton of Australian soccer to Melbourne Knights' Bernie Sanders, a comparison those fascists will love.

Will it be as successful? Only time will tell.

Let freedom's cry ring, again
Remember the so called 'gimmick' forum that was set up as a rival to smfcboard? Well that site being long moribund - you can't successfully register on there, nor have your password reset - it's interesting to see another alternative to smfcboard start up. I don't know who's started it or why, how long it will last, or even if it will fall prey to the same gimmickry which sunk the older gimmick forum, but at least someone's taking a stab at trying to get something new going.

Match programmes
Uploaded a few things, but mostly issues 11-20 of Studs Up. A problem which is developing is that I may very well have to start another website to host all the non-South stuff I'm being loaned, meaning a true Australian soccer library and not just one that's an adjunct to a blog about a club that 200 people care about.

Around the grounds
Tetanus for breakfast
One mediocre side (Port) hosting a sub mediocre one (Knights). Despite giving them that epithet, the Knights go about confounding the expectations of the teeming multitudes usual small crowd by being completely and irretrievably awful. The fortunate thing for them was that Port had no interest in scoring, refusing to pull the trigger during even one of their many favourable moments in the first half. Even having Melbourne Knights player of the century™ Milan Batur sent off and the awarding of a penalty didn't help, with Alan Kearney having his penalty saved. Knights got a penalty of their own and took the lead late in the first half, and . Knights were actually good watchable in the second half, and maybe should have taken all three points - but another penalty to Port, this time converted by Stirts, Stirts, Stirts, saw this game finish 1-1. During the International Year of the Fence it was fitting that the highlight of the evening was a certain notable former Melbourne Knights committeeman almost impaling himself on Port Melbourne's fence during an exciting moment.

Bad fence quality at Port Melbourne. #fencebitters #fencegate #PS4NPLVIC #pmvmk pic.twitter.com/kJMWpDRosi

— Paul Mavroudis (@PaulMavroudis) March 11, 2016

Still, as funny as it was witnessing the aforementioned injury because it wasn't me, one had to agree that clearly Port's fence situation is not up to scratch.

Principles of graphic design
Dockerty FFA Cup action out at Paisley Park, with Altona East hosting Beaumaris. After not giving two rats about knock-out soccer over the past few seasons, Altona East were hoping for a deep run this time around, Instead they found themselves in a deep hole (geddit?), down 2-0 and while they managed to get it back to 2-2 by half time, Beaumaris won a a see-sawing end to end affair 3-2. A exciting match but one that will be forNow there are two things that we can all agree upon:

1. I don't know that much about soccer.
2. Custard that has set firm and is eaten plain, is a pudding.

Leaving aside the second point for a moment, because I don't know that much about soccer the easy option would be to defer to expert opinion, which would mean learning about coaching, tactics, statistics etc. But the more difficult, perhaps even more noble option would be to go entirely in the opposite direction and force my unedumacated opinions on those playing the game. Watching Altona East pass, pass, pass the ball around, watching Port do the same, all for so little reward and even nearness to glory, made me think of who could possibly be employed from outside of football to teach pl;ayers how to recognise value and actuality of the spaces allocated to them to play on. Soccer coaches have clearly failed to teach players how to make proper decisions - have a think about this every time a player attempts a pass across the space-time continuum that is clearly doomed to fail.

The argument that even the modest elevation afforded to spectators at most state league grounds is superior to the atomic hurly burly of being on the field itself is a weak one. Myself and others like me, maybe even people like you, have stood on the fence line at the same level as players, and have seen them make the same errors of perception again and again. I admit that having seconds to make these decisions instead of hours, and having to contend with a moving object at your feet that makes you the focus makes things more difficult, but it's not like those of us watching on the sidelines don't have our distractions - it's not easy to pay attention to the goings on of a game while eating a souv or trying to check the footy scores.

So I think we need to bring in people from outside the game to teach players about the principles of the two and half (or is it four) dimensions the players participate in. Your first instinct would be to hire a physicist, but they would make things too complicated, what with the calculating for wind resistance and all. So I'm thinking what we need is graphic designers. Not artists, because graphic designers clearly aren't that, but someone with a basic degree who can teach players about concepts such perspective, the horizons, isometric views etc. We have tried getting people 'who know about the game' to fix these problems, and it hasn't worked. It's time to get people who know stuff about the illusions of space and sight to have a go.

#GoodWogBadWog
A valuable and succinct contribution to Ange Postecoglou's and FFA's trip to Oakleigh to announce the Socceroos squad.

@Cussen91 wog this way but don't wog that way

— Anthony Colangelo (@AnthColangelo) March 9, 2016

Final thought
Now even native bird life are taking part in the Poznan. Good grief.

A kookaburra parked itself on the crossbar at the scoreboard end during the match. #PS4NPLVIC #BLvSM pic.twitter.com/RFaVl2tkU3

— Paul Mavroudis (@PaulMavroudis) March 14, 2016

Assorted reactions to FFA's Whole of Football Plan

Now I'm not going to go into too much detail about a document whose contents were already decided before they'd even conducted their infamous box ticking consultation from 2014 (for some reason the most popular article ever on this blog). So they want to be the number one sport and cement their autocratic rule by abolishing the states. They told us that months ago - and if we're fair dinkum, there is nothing in this document that should surprise any of us. So here are a bunch of mostly hysterical reactions to this announcement.

Misplaced anger
Some people have been upset by the For Modern Football site's satirical take on South's press release. If anyone should be upset though it should be me, because I was doing this kind of stuff years ago.

Cynical
The stated aim of making soccer more affordable to play, especially junior registrations, is a motherhood statement that should be eclipsed by certain realities of the situation, including the backgrounds and statements of those putting forward that rhetoric.

When during the NPL consultation process former FFV CEO Mark Rendell compared the then potential cost of the NPL junior fees to a sport like swimming (as well as classifying South's then $3,500 program as a 'Rolls Royce' program); when Tom Kalas tried to justify the cost of that South program by comparing it to dance, music or karate; and when Kyle Patterson compared the costs of junior soccer to his kid's violin lessons - what does this mean in the context of making soccer more affordable for kids?

At best it's another motherhood statement in a document full of them; at worst, it's insincere about soccer's attempts to go middle class. It's language which speaks to an aspirational segment of Australian society which is not concerned primarily with cost, but with value. In the same way that increasing numbers of middle class people scrimp, save or make sacrifices to send their children to expensive private schools - and to hell with those left behind the in the public system - it's the perceived value that's more important than the price of that sacrifice.

[A side note - whether there is also a cultural and class consciousness element to this is also worth considering. Several years ago on a certain forum, a bloke posted his observation that some middle class English people were moving towards the upper class game of rugby union, in part because of the persistent and/or residual association of soccer with the working class. I don't know if that observation was accurate, and the English class system is obviously quite different to Australia's, but there is I think something intriguing about that assertion, and something that could very well be applicable to those who see soccer as providing a more cosmopolitan sporting option than the insular and boorish (bogan?) Aussie Rules and rugby league cultures.]

In other words, soccer is now a middle class game. The participant is only useful so long as they can be leveraged for more and more money. It's not about fun any more, or belonging to a club, or even being able to take up one sport during the winter and another during the summer. Each soccer loving individual in this country has had a monetary value placed upon their head, whether they are a player, parent, volunteer, fan, media person or even - and while undoubtedly a sign of the times, also a bit frightening - someone mostly interested in soccer video games. And like the cult-ish Evangelical mega-churches the 'we are football' branding and rhetoric reeks of these days, it's bring your credit card with you when you come to worship.

Of course if your bank balance is smaller, or if your involvement in the game generates minimal value for the upper tiers - or heaven forbid, doesn't agree with every part of this Great Leap Forward - you can go and get stuffed. This is disturbing to me because in my line of work I'm required (and want) to see the best in people and their potential. FFA does the opposite. The concept of people getting into and enjoying soccer as an end in itself has been thrown under the bus.

As increasingly seems to be the case these days, I'm reminded of a comment Melbourne Heart CEO Scott Munn made at an academic conference a few years back, about the relative pointlessness of school visits by his organisation.

As an aside, one of the more curious things that was said by Munn, was that one off attempts at trying to convert people to your cause like school clinics were almost doomed to fail (he used some clever analogy about pissing on your own leg - I can't remember how it went, but it was quite funny). 

This was a point expanded upon at last year's Whole of Football Plan meeting in Melbourne, when the failure to leverage soccer's existing base for the A-League was something which FFA wanted corrected (fair enough), but was a point nevertheless which showed how different the priorities of those at the top and those at the bottom were.

The FFA... seemed to think that things like school visits and absurdly inflated participation numbers - which included intangibles like kids playing street soccer - were all about converting kids into being A-League fans. The difference with those of the community club sector was the community club representatives were showing annoyance at the lack of school visits not because of the missed opportunity of getting kids to follow the A-League, but to get them involved with the game of soccer as opposed to other sports.

Some people think soccer is first and foremost a great game to be involved in. Others think the most important thing is not how much you enjoy the experience, but how much they can fleece you for. I guess this is why I'm not in marketing.

Gallows humour

SMFCBLUES07 wrote:

I'll do the honours here Press release: smfc wish to announce since there is no future in football we have abandoned ship and will refocus our efforts in strip clubs not social room

The one with a forced literary allusion
In Toni Morrison's novel Beloved,  the slaves learn that 'definitions belong to the definers, not the defined'. The FFA has spent the past ten years applying that lesson. Soccer is, among other things, wogs, violence, incompetence and marginality. Football is other things: good things, Australian things, mainstream things. Most importantly, FFA has learned from the disparagement that soccer received from other codes over the decades, and vowed that it would never succumb to the same fate - not only this, but they have striven to take it to the next level, by appropriating the language of the oppressor and using it as a successful example of wedge politics.

Terms like new dawn and bitter, mainstream and ethnic, new football and old soccer  - they all create division, and almost everyone has bought into them, this writer included. From our side of the fence, there have been those like the long gone Pumpkin Seed Eaters who have attempted creating other names, such as foundation clubs; journalists, when they weren't completely on the bandwagon, traditional clubs; FFV and FFA when they tried to find the most patronising PC term possible, community clubs. The net effect of all these definitions though was to point towards two directions - the past and the future.

Regardless of whether one got sucked into using the terms created by those with the power, or those without it - even my facetious and petty 'I am soccer' catchphrase in response to 'we are football' - the debate has been had on the powerful's terms. It's too late now to to start using different language in the hope that it will somehow turn everything around, but it's not too late to define ourselves outside of the parameters that have set. How we would do that, and what would be appropriate terms to use is an etymological process I'd be interested in seeing developed.

Official
The club released its own response, and it's another in a recent line of measured posts.

MEDIA RELEASE – THE POSSIBLE END OF ASPIRATIONAL FOOTBALL
May 6, 2015 

South Melbourne FC welcomes Football Federation Australia opening up the dialogue about Australia’s football future with the ‘Whole of Football Plan’ released on 5 May 2015. 

However, the current FFA Plan spells the possible end for aspirational football in this country. 

The proposed Plan currently provides no obvious club pathway that allows any club that aspires to develop and improve their process, systems and connection with their communities – or more importantly succeeds on the field – to be promoted as occurs throughout the football world. 

We are also disappointed that the FFA does not detail plans for further development of a second tier of Australian football, to facilitate the intended expansion of the Hyundai A-League and ultimately the implementation of a viable promotion and relegation system. 

Promotion and relegation would assist the improvement of the quality of our top division and provide a breeding ground for players, coaches, officials and aspiring clubs. 

More generally, a key component of all successful ‘plans’ is ‘implementation detail.’ We are keen to review that detail when it gets released. 

The FFA has certainly made great in-roads for our code’s development (for example football broadcasting and the launching of the Westfield FFA Cup), however we are mindful that strategic errors have also been made in the past. 

As a key stakeholder of football in Australia, we will be contacting the FFA to understand and obtain greater detail about their planning processes and to ensure the long term viability and growth of our club. 

Leo Athanasakis, SMFC President
Tom Kalas, SMFC Director

Whatever I may think of the club's approach over these past few years, I'm not going to go out and fault it. They tried to play nice, they tried to be conciliatory, they tried to be collegiate. Melbourne Knights tried to be difficult, tried to dig their heels in, tried to make a scene. No issue with that either. The fact is if they don't want you, they don't want you, and no amount of niceness or hostility is going to change things. Still, it'd be nice if some people, outside of those who are with us now, could have made a bit more of a fuss, if only for show.

Abandoned

This photo is the one the club chose to use to illustrate its press release. I made a comment on the club's Facebook page that it was slightly mischievous. It's a pointed reminder of what we once were, and where we are now. More importantly, it's a reminder that those who could, at the very least, speak up for us - not in an outrageous way, but in a way that they believe that we are still relevant - have chosen not to do so.

That the photo contains two of our most beloved members adds to the sting. And where's former president George Donikian? Spruiking the A-League semi-final with George Calombaris. Where is the Greek community?  At the A-League or the footy, or making fun of us on our Facebook page, telling us we're doomed, that we should give up because they have, and that there's a newer, shinier toy to play with. To be marginalised by the authorities is one thing, but to be marginalised by your own, that's the biggest insult. Making fun of us because we don't get the crowds we used to, as if the people pointing that out aren't part of that problem. And where will Enosi 59 be this week?

Boy, I really didn't see that one coming/Defeatist
Now the part of the announcement that most South fans (plus assorted remnants of old soccer and their associated new dawn sympathisers) picked up on was the FFA finally putting to rest promotion and relegation to the A-League. I am of course on the record as stating that I don't believe promotion is suitable for Australian soccer, and I still hold to that position. But no matter how harebrained I think that idea is, there is something I admire in it, and which seems to have been lost in the wash - and that is that at some level a belief in promotion and relegation is actually an endorsement in FFA, the last ten years and in the future of Australian soccer. It puts forward the belief that there is a viable future soccer in Australia, not just for the 'mainstream' but also the 'traditional'. It's a belief that's not about the old antagonisms, but about sharing a space.

If that's an example of the circumstances of the past ten years creating a sort of forced humility, then so be it. The problem with FFA's approach of incrementally increasing the number of teams in the top flight is that there is still no detail about what plan they'll use. Their own history on the matter is full of contradictions: last October Frank Lowy says that promotion and relegation will happen soon; now they rule it out; David Gallop says they'll fish where the fish are from now on, but now adds that any region with a population of 500,000 will be looked at, despite the problems of Central Coast and North Queensland; they briefly mention in the Whole f Football document that applications for an A-League licence from an NPL team would be possible, but offer no details, no pathway, no method.

Absurd (sans Simpsons reference)
So how do we get back to the top? If the A-League teams monopolise the majority of youth development, if no matter how well you do on and off the park you're effectively locked out, where's the incentive to excel by the processes of reform and self-improvement and by trying to follow the rules such as they exist in the NPL? To merely achieve the honour of being the longest lasting of the ethnic club museum pieces? When I asked on Twitter, rhetorically of course, for someone, anyone, to at least show us the hoops that we need to jump through to make the grade, Mark Bosnich offered to explain it to myself along with the others involved in the relevant discussion, in person next time he comes to Melbourne.

@jgrb @PaveJusup @pavlaki1969 simple,u guys r in Melbourne yes? When I'm down next time let me take u 2 lunch and listen 2 ur fears.xmb

— Mark Bosnich (@TheRealBozza) May 5, 2015

While I appreciate the gesture, and would happily take part in such a meeting, I'm curious as to what Bosnich thinks it will achieve. Does he have some special insight or inside knowledge that's not available to the rest of the soccer public?

Absurd (with Simpsons reference)

What I imagine Mark Bosnich will feel like if he ever follows through with his promise to meet with the bitters.

Personal
This isn't just a story about old soccer fans, or South fans in particular. This is a story that has deep resonance to me as an individual. Now I've never run a club, but I have the utmost respect for those people that do put their hand up to do it these days - even when I disagree with them, and even when they fail. No one is closer to the coal face than they are in terms of seeing the problems and institutional injustices every day, and no one understands them better.

But having written this blog for seven and a half years, and having been involved in the online arguments for long before that, I feel I have a unique relationship to this problem. Getting reconnected with South Melbourne in 2006, and having my writing on the forums praised and encouraged (especially by Ian Syson) has lead to a number of peculiar outcomes.

Firstly, for better and for worse I have become the chief voice of South Melbourne fans outside of what the club controls and what some fans on certain forums put out. My self-declared desire to be the reasonable one, to play a straight bat so to speak, has won me some admirers; but the overall effect has been that the necessity and rigour of trying to fine tune the arguments combined with the increasing and ongoing marginalisation of South means that I have found myself backed into an ideological corner.

I'm not alone in that corner, but that's not really the point. There have been plenty of times when I've been jubilant or outraged, cautiously optimistic or maudlin, inspired or defeatist - these are the general swings and roundabouts of being involved with the game at any level. The point here is that because of South Melbourne I have ended up with the career of sorts that I have now, and the option to be broader and more engaged with Australian soccer such as it exists these days.

Every few months I end up having a discussion with Ian Syson where he worries about my own increasing marginalisation in the soccer writing world, a world where he thinks I can contribute intelligent and cogent arguments to a wider reading audience than I do now. And yet every time we have this conversation, I find some myself being more adamant that I can't make myself be the kind of writer that Syson (and others) would want me to be; and instead of embracing those possibilities of taking an interest in and writing for a broader audience, with each passing year I find my focus getting narrower, and my outlook become one that can allow fewer compromises and extensions of faith and trust.

While a measure of this attitude is inevitably down to my being an introvert, a large part of it is because by associating myself so strongly with South Melbourne, I have been made smaller and more insular by the circumstances of our decline, and my reaction towards those whom I hold responsible. Thus as South has been marginalised culturally, so have I, and I can imagine that at times this is a feeling that many South fans have felt over the last ten years or so.

And while I'm a doom and gloom merchant by trade, the fact is that I don't like partaking in defeatism for the sake of defeatism. A former friend, from back in the days when I was involved with left-wing student politics at Melbourne University, who had me pegged as a hopeless pessimist, later told me that she'd been mistaken; that rather than being an outright pessimist, I was a foolhardy optimist, who when my expectations weren't met, descended into cynicism and irony as a coping mechanism. Amateur psychology it may have been, but the fact that she took the time to think about it resonated with me as much as the content of the message itself.

I resolved then to lower my expectations, to be more cautious. But no matter how much you try to do that, we as human beings inevitably see and come to understand these things through our own prism. In that way, South fans see this plan as hostile to our interests. Outside of us, an acquiescent and largely apathetic soccer public just goes along with it. All the pride, the incapacitating anger, the depression that we experience is at best for those outside of our sphere seen as a regrettable and ultimately forgettable novelty.

Having by and large conformed to the new regime, outsiders do not understand the pressure that exists to conform to or engage with this regime - and that by not doing so it means that you become smaller, narrower, and seen as selfish almost by default, when all you as a dedicated South fan see is your loyalty to the cause. I know this, because having been briefly on the other side of this schism, I've learned the arguments from both sides.

We have collectively been made smaller by the experience. There are people who have lost their passion for the game entirely, while others have given up the ghost on the national team. On the latter point, despite my diminished passion for the Socceroos, I never thought that I'd get to the point where I felt my relationship to the national team would have felt like it had been poisoned by South's predicament, but that's where I am now. It takes a certain level of intestinal fortitude to resist, which at times becomes too much to bear - when seen from the outside, it seems as if all sense of perspective is lost

There were many times when I was writing this post where I had to stop because I was so angry and despondent. That we care that much should be seen as a strength, not a weakness; but how do we convince not only others but ourselves, too, of that fact?

Pragmatic fatalism
So what do we do now? The same thing we always do. Support the club, try our best to make it bigger and better despite all the obstacles that we face. In that way we not only honour the work being put in now, but the history of the club as a whole.

A measured response to David Gallop's 'state of the football nation' address

The following missive was sent to us by the same writer of last year's popular anti-NPL piece. Feel free to share and comment upon this effort.


Well, I was really looking forward to this when I heard Football Federation Australia CEO David Gallop was going to address the public – but like most things in Australian soccer, and life, it has served to disappoint and reinforce the entrenched power structure to continue on as it pleases. What a great box ticking exercise to get the sheeple in a hype over the start of the A-league season, while at the same time showing the ‘unconverted’ how forward thinking and hip soccer is. Yes, you know that you’re in for a bad read when I refuse to use the word football. I grew up knowing the game as soccer and I’m not ashamed to use that word. If I was as well-heeled as Frank Lowy I might be inclined to get the Skyhooks to do a remake - 'Soccer is not a dirty word' has a nice ring to it. Kind of like Coles teaming up with Status Quo, but I digress, maybe on a further tangent than where Paul Mavroudis has ever dared to venture. Probably not. That guy is wacky in an intriguing kind of way. I’m not. I’m pretty straight up and if you’ve been following my not so infrequent tirades against the (soccer) man you’ll know that what I’m about to tell you is going to be frank, open and in your face. Some of you may not like it, but do I care? No, because the truth is confronting and speaking it is not a crime, should not be frowned upon and is the morally upright thing to do.

Leading into the Gallop ‘speech’ I was thinking to myself which David Gallop would turn up. Would it be the David Gallop that has been polished out of recognition by the marketing department’s copywriters? Those pesky fedora wearing types that sit in a dimly lit room smoking hand rolled pencil thin cigarettes churning out the annoyingly catchy buzzwords that corporate Australia loves to latch onto? What the fuck is robust?

Anyway, it was as I thought. A thoroughly rehearsed, bland and ultimately false-hearted delivery by a guy that is capable of much better. But, you can’t blame him. I mean you can, but I won’t, not just yet. Let’s begin where David Gallop begins:

Everywhere you look at the moment, you can see that Australian football is enjoying a golden period. And it's about to get better. The months ahead have the making of football's biggest ever summer.

We have an unprecedented run of finals, tournaments and big occasions that will see the game of football in the daily lives of more Australians than ever before.

I wouldn’t go so far as to say golden period - but if that’s the way you want to spin it, I’ll let that go because I see through that shit, as do most people – especially the ones that are so rusted on and fanatical about the game that they will watch an exercise in ticking boxes from a soccer administrator.

The game has 1.9 million participants - the biggest of any sport in this country - but we expect to see the football family swell in the months ahead.

David, this is a lie. The FFA marketing department, and you as its mouthpiece, love to bring out this line whenever they get the chance. It’s a good line as well. The biggest participation numbers of any sport in this country. Wow. If only it were true. This number, as you know, is based on the FIFA Big Count where Australia is ranked in the mid 50s. The FIFA Big Count is split into three categories. The first is registered players which National Associations cannot falsify, as you’d know it’s part of FFA’s official reporting to the world body for soccer. The number of registered players in Australia is 435,728. There is another section which is in regards to unregistered players, or players that play socially, in church competitions and other parts of the game such as indoor soccer not under the auspices of the FFA. This is an estimated number put forward by each association and then vetted by FIFA. This number is 535,000. The third and final section relates to officials (being match officials, club officials, registered coaches etc.) – this number is 67,632. This gives us a grand total of 970,728. It’s an impressive number, but the one that really counts is the number of registered participants. That’s 435,728.

All the other numbers are irrelevant. Your recent survey which you commissioned with the purpose of inflating Australia’s participation numbers, because of the age old soccer small man complex that has infected the game in some quarters ever since I can remember is a big fat lie. The FIFA Big Count numbers more than likely have double and in some cases triple counted participants (a person that simultaneously plays for a club, plays indoor or school soccer and coaches, referees or is in a club committee) which is a concern, but how you got to 1,960,000 participants is anyone’s guess. Creative accounting was never my forte. Please stop bringing out this propaganda, because people see through it for the most part, and it’s kind of embarrassing that our own national body craves relevance so badly. This is a good point of reference from a source that is more reliable than a privately commissioned survey designed to reinforce how good you are.

We'll have record-numbers of Australian fans in stadiums watching the Socceroos at the Asian Cup, the Hyundai-A-League's momentous Season 10, the Westfield W-League, which is underway right now, and the final stages of the Westfield FFA Cup and PlayStation 4 National Premier Leagues finals.

Australian football will be on the TV screens in homes, pubs and clubs, in digital channels and social media - and we expect bigger audiences than ever before.

These are all good things and I can’t disagree with much here.

And because of the game's booming profile, the mainstream media will generate more attention than ever before.

Football has a great story to tell, and I thank all the media here today for their interest in telling it to your readers, listeners and viewers.

Read: thanks to the media for getting behind us, you’ve been a powerful ally in propagating our message for the most part.

You can see there are six trophies up here today... three will be won before Christmas, and three after...

The three before are the PlayStation 4 National Premier Leagues trophy, the Westfield FFA Cup and the Westfield W-League trophy.

And the Hyundai A-League Premiers Plate, the Hyundai A-League Championship trophy and of course the AFC Asian Cup.

There'll be all sorts of drama, great football and magical moments before the silverware you see here is held aloft by the winners -- but that's just part of the story.

This exciting period for Australian football is book-ended by two major global events ... the FIFA World Cup in Brazil earlier this year and the FIFA Women's World Cup in Canada next year.

Having the Socceroos and Westfield Matildas at World Cups creates a wonderful halo around Australian football and showcases what it means for Australia to be a part of the world game.

This is one area where any Australian soccer administrator can’t make a mistake and is something 99% of people within the game agree on – that the Socceroos are the single most unifying factor within the sport.

There are other major factors at play to make this a remarkable time for the game.

Firstly, the convergence on the calendar of so many events - from international to the grassroots - and the way they showcase a sport so full of opportunity, optimism and growth.

Secondly, we're seeing the connection between all the tiers of our game come to life - it's closer and more productive than ever before.

This is currently my most hated buzzword coming out of head office. Connection between all the tiers. What fucking connection? There is no connection. There is no promotion and relegation to and from the A-league. Likewise in some states, the new-old NPLs have also entrenched clubs as either ‘elite’ or ‘community’ (two more shit corporate buzzwords that can fuck right off) while at the same time people generally go about their soccer business (playing, supporting, administrating) at the non-A-League level totally oblivious and very much in contempt of any metaphysical connection that you have cooked up on Level 22 in Oxford Street. You talk about connection? There are currently the privileged and the rest. Ten teams (I won’t give them the courtesy of being called a club, because it takes more than a graphic designer with a design brief to create a club) receive a television rights dividend of $2.5M per annum from the FFA to cover player wages and to ensure the sustainability of the league.

Meanwhile, the rest of the clubs up and down the country have to self-finance to field teams in all ages, find sponsors (normally friends or family) and volunteers to work in the kiosks to sell the dim sims and kransky rolls that go into subsidising the costs of the clubs. And when a club like this, run on a totally voluntary basis for the love of the club and by extension the game actually contributes to the greater good of Australian soccer by producing, unearthing and nurturing a player to a high level of quality – he is stolen away by the privileged few at the top, who not only get their TV money, but at the same time get free pickings to any player in the country. And then they sell him off for a big profit while the little club is still selling South Melbourne Dim Sims. What do these clubs that do the hard lifting get? A token mention on Fox Sports about player 'x' coming from club 'y'. Yeah, club 'y' has good 'z' (food). Awesome connection.

The lower tiers of the sport (and by that I mean anything not the A-League) are not there to be servants to the A-League. This is where our philosophies diverge. You have a Head of Community Football, who I thought was responsible for looking into and taking care of everything except the A-League. But no, the God of the FFA, the almighty dollar, dictates that this position is for a person to engage ‘community football’. What does this mean? This means that not a fuck was given by FFA to the plight of anything but the A-League – so much so that the Head of Community Football’s job is to go out and ‘engage’ with these ‘community football’ clubs and basically sell them why the A-League is so good and why they should all jump on board to follow the A-League. So it’s actually not about helping these clubs up, it’s about helping the A-League up while shitting on anything else below. That’s been the modus operandi since day one. You shouldn’t be surprised, but you are a little bit, I know you are.

The success of the Westfield FFA Cup is proof. That's an historic development - the football community is moving as one.

The announcement of the FFA Cup is a welcome one. The Cup has been a good step in the right direction. However, the tokenism of, for example, calling South Springvale a pub team, when most in Victoria know that they have a relatively high budget is pretty disingenuous. On top of that, you keep banging on about the magic of the cup, 'like our very own FA Cup' – like England is the only country in the world to have a cup competition. Australian soccer has gone backwards in some respects - where before we were comfortable within our own skin, ability and knowledge, now we continue to second guess ourselves. The football community is not moving as one. Your number one priority is the A-League, and there are still plenty of people out there that don’t want a bar of it and care deeply about their traditional club, youth development, futsal, the Pararoos and another whole host of ‘agendas’, for want of a better word.

Unity of purpose - too often a question posed about us, rather than an affirmation - is now a strength.

No it isn’t. We don’t have a unity of purpose and I don’t think we ever will because the history of the game in this country is disjointed and I don’t think you stating that we are all on the same page makes it true. Nice words, no substance.

That's why today - on behalf of the football community - FFA is making a major statement on the future of Australian football.

It's time for a National Plan for the Whole of Football that will set us on our way to making football the biggest and most popular game in Australia.

Wait, what you’ve done over the past 10 years was without a strategic plan? Or is it that you’ve realised that there’s more to soccer than the top national domestic division into which you have sunk most of your time an energy as an organisation?

This is not a plan just for FFA; it's a plan for the Whole of Football.

From the five year old playing MiniRoos to the heroes playing for the Socceroos.

From the grassroots of community football to the pillars of the professional game.

For all the stakeholders and all the partners at all levels of the game.

I find that very hard to believe. FFA since its inception, and at the behest of Frank Lowy has been an organisation in a position of absolute power. He wouldn’t have taken it on if he wasn’t guaranteed a tenure, because as we all know and sometimes forget, Mr. Lowy took his ball and ran home in 1987 after his team had already played a match in the national league that year. What people accuse those on the outside today of doing, Lowy did himself in trying to destabilise the game when he didn’t get his way like a petulant little child. Just to prove to you what the FFA thinks about stakeholder engagement – I’ll run through the National Constitution just quickly. Specifically Rule 3.5 relating to Standing Committees. The Directors must establish Standing Committee x, y, z etc. I started to investigate these national standing committees. When I couldn’t find them listed or referenced anywhere, I called Head Office. I spoke to a person in the legal department who relayed to me that the FFA hasn’t had the need or ability to convene these Standing Committees. Oh, OK then. It must be all too hard. So let's recap. The FFA has within its Constitution provisions that it have certain Standing Committees (like the State Federations) that will give advice to the Board on issues that it has been convened under. The FFA decides not to have these Standing Committees at all. And you keep believing that they give a shit about you and your shit opinion.

It's a plan for all the fans who love this game and those who are on the mission with us.

I suppose I’m firmly in the not with ‘us’ camp. It’s OK, I’ve been called much worse before. It’s just disappointing that the FFA thinks they ‘own’ the game, can control its dynamic wishes and ultimately decide who can and can’t be a part of the mission. Seems like my description of the old wog clubs and their disciples, of which I am a proud standard bearer was right – they do see us as a dangerous fifth column.

The need for this plan has become obvious to me after almost two years as CEO of FFA.

I am excited and ambitious for the game, but I've come to understand that Australian football suffers from a "burden of opportunity".

It's the reality we see today - the game has a huge growth trajectory and massive potential, but we don't always have the capital, the resources and the structures to harvest the opportunity.

To put it another way, we have many mouths to feed, but rarely do we have enough to go around.

We could sit and wait for things to change, and certainly the game will continue to grow if we were to continue our current course, but leadership demands more of us at FFA.

I agree to a certain extent, but I am cautious to believe you as you’ve disappointed on a number of occasions, not least of which your recent correspondence with a fellow concerned football administrator. He wrote to FIFA about promotion and relegation in regards to the statutes and the A-League, you cracked the shits when you found out and basically asked him not to write to FIFA but to you. So he did and asked the same question. Your reply was more words with no substance. Basically, there will be promotion and relegation, one day. When is that day? Ignore and talk about something else. These CEOs must have a module at school on how to talk without being pinned down to anything specific. I reckon there is room to make a compilation of AFL journalists asking questions of Andrew Demetriou being answered by the CEOs of other sports. You all speak the same double-Dutch, no pun intended.

The National Plan for the Whole of Football will not be an overnight fix, and it will take longer than the next four-year World Cup cycle.

Yeah, we’ve heard that give us time rhetoric before. National Curriculum anyone?

But we need to start and the first step is to galvanise this generation to address this challenge. I will have more to say later on how we intend to proceed.

First, it's important that we celebrate the State of the Game today, because we are in amazing shape for a sport that was on its knees just a decade ago.

The sport was never on its knees. The national body was broke (none of the States were) and was subjected to various political maneuvering to allow for the messianic complex of the Australian soccer pleb to be fulfilled. Clubs across the country were in better shape overall then, than they are today, especially at the lower levels.

This summer, in the middle of the busiest domestic calendar on record, our nation will host the biggest football event we've ever seen.

The AFC Asian Cup is bigger than anything we've seen since the 2000 Olympic Games.

16 nations, 32 matches in 23 days in five cities. That's big enough from a sporting point of view, but beyond the tournament and the matches, football is bringing the Asian Century to life in our own backyard.

I’m a lifelong soccer fan, and up until recently I didn’t know much about the Asian Cup. Most people couldn’t give a shit about it. It’s not going to capture the national audience like you hope it will, I wish I was wrong but that is the reality of it.

Australians will see Asian football and culture on show. And from the outside looking at us, Asian audiences up to 1.3 billion will see Australia on show.

This is nothing new, of course. Our national teams and Hyundai A-League clubs have been building links Asia for years, especially with Western Sydney Wanderers and their fantastic run through to the semi finals of the Asian Champions League.

The Wanderers' 0-0 draw last night in Seoul leaving them tantalisingly close to the Asian Champions League Final.

Football is leading the way for Australia in the people-to-people connections in Asia.

It's another way that football is once again playing a crucial role in nation building.

I agree, but again, much more can be done. Instead of A-League clubs signing washed up hacks, why not sign a promising Vietnamese player that will forge that link between Australian soccer and Vietnamese soccer, as well as the large Vietnamese community in Australia? This is much more beneficial to the connections to Asia and the future of the game, rather than signing the Mario Jardels of the world.

Our game is inclusive, accessible, multicultural and international - they are the qualities that make Australia such a diverse and successful nation.

I was hoping you weren’t going to give me an opening to bring up the National Club Identity Policy, but now I have to. When the policy was released, you were quoted as saying; “The intent of the National Club Identity Policy is to ensure the game remains inclusive and accessible, not just in the way we organise ourselves, but in how we engage with the community. The very name and logo of a club sends a message about what that club stands for. We want clubs that stand for uniting people through the joy of football,” You may want clubs that fit a neat little box so that the marketing department has a straightforward sell, but imposing your political opinions upon the clubs in your jurisdiction is not your place. So step off.

Secondly, the wording of the policy states as a preamble “FFA acknowledges the multicultural nature of Australia and the valuable contribution that various communities have made to the historical development of football in Australia. FFA also respects Clubs’ desires to acknowledge their heritage and contribution to their local communities. FFA has a responsibility to protect and grow the reputation of the sport of football in Australia and to ensure its openness and accessibility to all Australians.”

No you don’t Davy boy. No you don’t. You can’t have it both ways. Either you embrace multiculturalism, warts and all, or you go down the assimilation path which is your policy in practice, not theory. You say that the name and logo of a club sends a message about what the club stands for – if a club chooses to call itself Morwell Italia to cater for the Australian-Italian community in the La Trobe Valley, who are you or anyone else to say that they can’t or shouldn’t or that their message through their name and symbolism is not to be tolerated? It is a club’s choice to stand for whatever they like. For whatever reason, and this is related to your earlier point, if you don’t fit the bill, your plan is to excommunicate (in some way) those that don’t toe the line. I think you’ve bitten off a little more than you can chew here and I sincerely hope that it bites you, and everyone else that has their dirty fingerprints over it on the arse.

By excluding certain types of personal and collective expression through soccer, you are being the opposite of inclusive. By stopping multicultural communities of Australia publicly displaying their culture is being the opposite of multicultural.

Beyond the sporting, cultural and social links, we're now seeing Asian investment driven by football - the $12 million takeover of Melbourne City by the Abu Dhabi interests, the owners of Manchester City, is a snapshot of our future.

I like to say that "as the world gets smaller, football gets bigger" - our game will make sure Australia is always a vibrant player in sport's global community.

The Asian Cup is a festival of football not to be missed. The joyous scenes of Brazil will be coming to your backyard. Tickets are on sale, so let's "Unite for the Asian Cup".

Blah blah, words, buy tickets, Asian Cup, blah.

Let me share the insights to the domestic game that have me seeing blue sky for the summer ahead...

The Hyundai A-League is on target to set new benchmarks for attendance, TV viewership, digital engagement and club membership.

The aggregate attendance is set to surpass 2 million for the first time.

We're aiming for a fourth straight year of TV ratings growth, to see a weekly viewership of 660,000.

The boom in digital and social channels shows no signs of slowing, with 2 million web users and 1 million followers on social media.

Across the league, club membership is currently 13% ahead of the same stage as last season and on-course to break the 100,000 mark for the first time.

Thanks to the huge vote of confidence from SBS TV, we'll have unprecedented reach and audiences for the A-League with the move of Harvey Norman Friday Night Football to the primary free-to-air channel SBS ONE.

The same is true internationally. New rights agreements in India and Africa mean the weekly reach of the Hyundai A-League will top 300 million across 30 nations and five continents.

Of course, this season will celebrate 10 years with our primary broadcast partner Fox Sports, a foundation investor in the Hyundai A-League.

Fox Sports has covered every game live since day one - and given millions of Australians world-class coverage of the competition.

Tomorrow, the attention turns to the terraces. The Hyundai A-League National Ticket On-Sale gives fans the chance to secure their seat for the big matches in Season 10.

This week, the pre-sale for Sydney Derby was the hottest ticket in town - Wanderers members bought at a rate that outstripped two finals in another code.

The Sydney Derby will sell out once again - so if you want to sample this incredible event, go to www.a-league.com.au/tickets from 9am tomorrow (Friday).

Another blockbuster on sale tomorrow will be the Adelaide United v Melbourne Victory match at Adelaide Oval in round 2.

The fixture was a sell out at Hindmarsh Stadium last season, and we expect a new record Hyundai A-League crowd for Adelaide.

Sydney FC's opening round match against the new Melbourne City outfit is also selling strongly, no doubt driven by the expectation of seeing the Spanish World Cup star David Villa.

It's really pleasing to see so many great Australian players choosing to stay in the competition - it's notable that Mark Milligan, a starting X1 player at the World Cup in Brazil, has chosen to stay with Melbourne Victory.

This is a dividend of the growing stature of the Hyundai A-League.

It's the fastest growing professional competition in Australia because it gives us fantastic football, star players and the best atmosphere you'll experience. I can't wait for the kick off.

As expected, the largest chunk of the address reserved for the A-League. Surprised? I’m not.

Last weekend the Westfield W-League started - again with live TV coverage on ABC TV -- and is heading for a Grand Final on 21 December.

Our finest female players are also on the mission of making the Matildas squad for FIFA Women's World Cup in Canada next May.

One of our top priorities is to appoint a new Head Coach of the Matildas, and that's now just days away.

I don’t want to come off sounding sexist, but the women’s game doesn’t interest me at all. Not that I want it to be hampered or discriminated against, it just doesn’t interest me.

There's a renewed mission for women's football thanks to a $500,000 development grant from FIFA and we're building stronger player pathways for our rising talent.

It’s a nice touch to mention FIFA’s grant, but it’s really a drop in the ocean compared to the funding that the women’s game needs.

The FIFA grant will partly fund nine development officers into the community across Australia.

See above.

Females already make up more than 20% of our participation base and we are forecasting the numbers to grow strongly in the years ahead. It's our big point of difference in the Australian context and we intend to make the most of it.

See three points above.

Right now, we are in the midst of the Westfield FFA Cup Round of 16 and can I say I've never seen a new competition make such an impact on the Australian sporting landscape.

It's not just the romance and upsets of cup football - this is a festival of the Australian game.

From the self-titled "pub team" of South Springvale to the national champions Brisbane Roar, we have a great mix of clubs from across the country.

One of my favourite moments was the Thomas Love goal for Adelaide City that knocked out the Wanderers - whatever else he achieves, Thomas will go down in folklore for that goal.

The magic of the Cup has captured the imagination of sports fans everywhere.

If I may say, I'm so proud of the way FFA has rolled out the Cup in conjunction with the Member Federations, commercial partners in Westfield, NAB, Harvey Norman and Umbro and our broadcast partner Fox Sports.

Yes, give yourself a pat on the back for starting a Cup competition that could have begun in 2005, but didn’t because the FFA wanted to protect the A-League at all costs. Rules still exist in all states that don’t allow any games to be held at the same time as an A-League match, at the discretion of FFA and the local federation. Has everyone forgotten that?

We talk a lot about the strategic objective to connect the grassroots to the professional tier - well; here it is, alive and kicking.

See above for explanation about buzzword ‘connecting grassroots’ et cetera.

Best of all, we have a countdown of dramatic mid-week matches still to come before we reach the inaugural FFA Cup final on Tuesday 16 December.

I can tell you now, other sports would love to have this sort of opportunity, but it can only happen in a game based primarily on skill, not those based on collisions.

Cue crappily veiled troll of other sports. Was waiting for this. A bit of a letdown to be honest.

In the first week of October, the Grand Final of the PlayStation 4 National Premier Leagues will be another chance to elevate the semi-pro tier to the national stage.

OK, how in fact does it elevate them to the national stage? In actual fact, what is the point of the national playoff anyway? You can’t get promoted into the A-League, there is no prize money on offer, your club might get the opportunity to play one or two games in a national playoff once every 7-8 years or so if you’re lucky. Awesome. Can’t wait for South to play in the NPL playoffs again in 2021. Hopefully they’d have invented those wretched hover boards by then.

This year we have clubs from eight state and territory member federations in the play-offs to be crowned NPL champions.

The NPL is the engine room of our player development pathways and - again - a vital connection between local clubs and the national tier.

So far I have counted three. Connection, local losers and national glamour.

So far that's three glittering occasions - the Westfield W-League Grand Final, Westfield FFA Cup final and PS4 NPL Grand Final - all before Christmas.

That's an entree to our national team the Socceroos to take centre stage and seek to become champions of Asia.

Without doubt, Socceroo coach Ange Postecoglou has transformed the team - on and off the pitch - in a matter of months.

The FIFA World Cup showed his strategy of bringing the best young players into the team is quickly delivering results - our team played really attractive football in Brazil.

Already, some of the young guns - like Jason Davidson, Adam Taggart and Josh Brillante - have moved to bigger clubs in Europe.

This is a key part of Ange's plan to rebuild our national team, by fast-tracking our best young players and having more Aussies playing against the world's best, week-in, week-out.

Next month we travel to the Gulf to face the UAE and Qatar and in November we travel to Japan.

Each step advances the cause of the Socceroos and their rebuilding as a national team that truly unites the nation. We saw the journey commence in Brazil, just wait till you see it at home.

What happens on the pitch is the rightfully the main focus of fans and media. What happens behind the scenes is my responsibility.

Let me preface this; personally, I don’t think Ange Postecoglou is a bad or incapable coach. The current bunch of players that we have, and more importantly the ones coming through are incapable of achieving results that mirror or exceed the 2006 World Cup results. Hang on, let’s take a step back and qualify for the next one as a start. I wouldn’t want to be in his position to be honest, not going to be easy.

It's fair to say that the game's governance structures have been a work-in-progress since the reform process of the Crawford report in 2003, and the inauguration of the FFA under the leadership of Frank Lowy in 2004.

Frank Lowy and his board have done so much - starting new national competitions, qualifying for World Cups and joining Asia.

Our chairman's energy and commitment is a source of inspiration to so many people and I want to personally acknowledge his guidance and wisdom.

FFA could not have done this in a decade without the support of so many companies, broadcasters and governments.

At least he admitted (in a long bow kind of way) that the Governance Structures of the Crawford Report were designed in a way to give Lowy absolute control and no threat of a takeover. After that was achieved nothing else was important. Not Standing Committees (see above), not actual accountability…

There are too many to name individually, so you'll see our acknowledgement on the video screens.

I personally thank the leaders of these organisations. They see the opportunity that football presents and we applaud their vision.

Let me return to our major announcement - a National Plan for the Whole of Football.

It's a sign of our confidence in the future and our determination to build on today's foundations - to turn the "burden of opportunity" into an institutional strength and prosperity.

The plan will put the football community at the heart of everything that's important.

If you are a player, a fan, a volunteer, an avid TV watcher - if you are among those who love this game - you are incredibly important to this plan.

And the plan will be critically important to your future enjoyment of the beautiful game.

The scope of the National Plan and some of the key questions for the football community look like this;

In elite player and coach development, I have no doubt we need to overhaul the way we do things. Do we want to see others in Asia setting the standards, or do we want to be the leader?

I don’t think Australia, or any country outside of South America or Europe will be able to develop players to a world standard in house. Why we continue to bang on about this implausibility is anyone’s guess. Our efforts should be centred around a concerted plan in promoting what the Crawford Report wanted to stop (and did) – the player drain of young talented Australian players going to Europe. For the national league this was a bad thing. For the national team, it was great. You have to find a balance and decide which is more important. I think the answer is pretty obvious.

* For our national teams, qualifying for World Cups is fantastic, but do we want to be a contender and challenge the elite nations?

Unless soccer becomes the number one sport in this country and our population grows quickly, only then can we begin to try and be a contender and challenger to the elite nations. Both of those things are out of our control and unlikely to happen.

* Community football is currently a strength in the participation base and our collaboration with our Member Federations. But is it enough to have a model primarily based on clubs and outdoor football when so many people want to play indoor, at schools or just for fun in parks?

So many people do play indoor, in school and just for fun? This statement doesn’t really make sense as the FFA doesn’t receive any income from any of those three activities.

* Facilities are at the heart of our game, but how can we thrive as a sport when the space to play remains a critical shortage?

By lobbying Government for a $1B facilities fund. Without it, it will be left to the clubs to scrounge together the money to get it done, and in that case, it will never be done to the standard needed or in the time-frame needed

* Our national competitions, the Hyundai A-League, Westfield W-League, PS4 NPL and Westfield FFA Cup provide us with a 12-month of the year calendar, but structures, connections and expansion are big questions for our future.What? Connections, again?

* Fan Engagement is the life-blood of everything we do, whether it's in the community, with our major brands or through the many channels where you find football content. But we need to stay ahead of the trend in this digital world if the football family is to remain strong.

Fan engagement = converting people into customers of the A-League above all else. It isn’t a conspiracy, he just said it. Don’t say I didn’t tell you that it’s the FFA’s number one priority above all else. Why have a vibrant 2nd, 3rd or 4th tier that’s well supported when they’ll be considered a threat to our plan to convert every fan of the game into a fan of the A-League. Why not be happy that people are part of the game supporting their club, whether they play or watch in the local league, State league or NPL?

* Commercial revenues are the dividends of a successful sport, but we know we need to do a better job telling corporate Australia about the massive potential if we are to have the resources to deliver on the game's promise.

Every other time I’ve heard Gallop and the FFA speak about this it has been a very rosy picture of moving forwards in leaps and bounds and gaining the confidence of corporate Australia – this is the first sign of alarm in this regard. Interesting development.

* And our governance structures need to be aligned, efficient and ready for the challenge. Every stakeholder needs to know their role and have the trust in others, and that's the starting point of our ambitious thinking.

The Governance Structures were designed with the specific intention of limiting the influence of stakeholders, and now you want them to push your agenda onto those they have influence over? So either toe the company line and you’re a good bloke, or speak up about the massive structural issues within the game and be condemned a trouble maker.

The first phase of the National Plan is to listen to the game's key stakeholders - clubs at all levels and their members, our state and territory Member Federations, sponsors, broadcast partners, governments and stadium managers.

That is rich. This comes only a month or so after the announcement of the National Club Identity Policy by the FFA where they failed to ask a single club about what they thought of the policy prior to its publication. So someone got an idea in their head that we need this policy, went to the trouble of writing it up, presented it to the State Federations and passed it as gospel. Where and who did they listen to in that instance? I can’t see this organisation and its culture changing from being outright belligerent towards anyone with an opposing view to inclusive and listening.

We'll consult individual participants and fans via an online portal that will capture the voice of the people.

I suppose the results of which will not be made public? Definitely not. Because I could easily hire 50,000 bots proposing a variation of the same idea, it being the overwhelming response to the consultation and it still won’t be accepted as what the people want. If it’s not in line with what FFA and Frank Lowy wants, it won’t happen. The whole thing is a sham and a farce and will not be transparent, like everything else they’ve ever done.

The outcome of this national plan will be a road map to guide all the key stakeholders in the game.

To achieve that, we need to align all the game's stakeholders - without unity of purpose, we can't make a difference.

There's no time to waste. We aim to publish the National Plan at the conclusion of the Asian Cup.

And what of it? After it’s published it’ll be another nice piece of paperwork to add to the National Curriculum, Coaching Handbooks and other wastes of time that the FFA has wasted resources and energy on. More actions, less words.

We need to capture the momentum and make the most of our biggest ever summer.

There is no momentum to capture. The game is in a state of flux, and if you can’t see that – we’ve got even bigger issues than what I thought.

We want to see this simple, skilful and safe game played in every backyard, every school ground and every suburban pitch.

Cue second subtle troll.

We'll do that by ensuring our sport is always inclusive, accessible and multicultural.

Cue second hypocritical lie about inclusiveness and multiculturalism. How do these cocksuckers sleep at night?

This summer, the vision will come into focus. We'll see opportunities starting to turn into tangible achievements.

I’m not holding my breath.

We'll see the enormous promise take shape in our competitions week-in, week-out

We will see football looking forward with dreams that can become reality.

We will unite people in the joy of football -- especially this summer.

I just know you can't wait to be a part of it.

We Are Football. Thank you.

OK, that ended with a barrage of clichés that hurt my brain. If it has indeed whipped the plebs into a frenzy of Craig Foster-esque parochialism, I suppose it has done its job – but I, and many others are after a bit more substance and maturity from a body that is responsible for the promotion and regulation of the sport of soccer.