Women’s Football Council questioning why they had no involvement in the investigation and instead FFA got the gender warriors involved. This stinks to high heaven.

Christ some of you kids are precious. Details are still pretty slim, other than the fact that there were surveys done, and the powers that be are bound from talking by 'legal protections', but you've all constructed a detailed narrative that ironically allows you to carry on like a bunch of triggered SJWs.

Coaches get fired in the men's game for losing the dressing room all the time, and nobody claims it's the end of society as we know it. Some of you need to chill with the feelings and wait for the facts.

The ultimate irony is that you've all prematurely condemned people based on little information - for prematurely condemning people based on little information. 

Usually when a coach loses a dressing room you don’t have multiple players coming out in support of the coach and saying they are totally bewildered by the decision. I’d call that more of an irony, wouldn’t you?

This. I think most people are right in demanding to know why a successful coach has been given the sack 5 months out from a World Cup which Australia are a genuine chance to win. It doesn't make sense.
The only thing I can think of is that he has done something inappropriate to/with one or more of the players and revealing this would be more damaging than not providing a reason.

That’s actually pretty common. Even when Mourinho was just sacked at United players came out and publicly supported him after the decision.

Fans deserve a better explanation than what we’ve got though. There are people involved in the game who hinted that if whatever happened was allowed to be made public that the fans would be in support of the decision. Others are completely shocked and want answers.

I think it will be pretty telling though if he doesn’t come out and defend himself in the near future. No payout is worth some of the speculation and rumours being put against his name.

If he was bullying and intimidating young national team players to "toughen them up", then he deserved to go. That's a fucking dinosaur way of coaching and I'm glad they're trying to root it out. 

IF that was the reason. I agree that the FFA should have explained it much better and that the timing is most unfortunate. 

@99problems. Poor analogy. Obvious difference is that Mourinho was sacked based on results and there was ongoing speculation for months. Didn’t hear any players saying they were even mildly surprised let alone ‘shocked’.
What I don’t understand is that there are some journos (eg Lucy Zelic) implying that this decision is completely understandable. If true, why weren’t they doing their jobs and exposing the supposedly ‘toxic environment’?

Thing is...according to the FAA this had been building for several months. If he had done something inappropriate to one or more players then instant dismissal and possibly legal charges being layed would seem more likely...so although it’s possible that doesn’t really make sense either.

And if it would be more damaging to the team/sport/whoever to reveal the truth....then why not use the old ‘mutual parting of ways’ to save face.....gallop using double speak raising more q’s than it answers.

Until something concrete and damning against the coach is revealed then you have to back him.....the fact that the assistant coach resigned over the fiasco and the women’s council were not even consulted prior says a lot.....regardless of ‘confidentiality’.

@Derided. What do you consider bullying? Raising your voice? Making the team do extra drills?
I’m genuinely interested, because that term is way too easily thrown around these days. I expect you’d consider throwing a boot at a player to be bullying, but doubt you ever called for Sir Alex to be sacked.

From Michael Lynch at the smh:
“However, Stajcic is unlikely to be the only change. It is believed a rift between Stajcic and his assistant, Gary van Egmond, has further divided the squad. The Matildas assistant is understood to be the next to be hauled in front of the FFA board to answer the hard questions.”

Always a great idea to have one of the player’s dad as assistant coach. No chance of selection disputes arising ....

Phil moss, the reasons behind it are murky, ambiguous at best;
http://media.skyracing.com.au/POD/59/BATPqY.mp3

Throwing a boot at a player's face is assault. Ferguson got away with it because of his reputation and his untouchable status in the game, but I can't believe you'd consider that appropriate behaviour for a football coach. 

And bullying is bullying. Making the team do extra drills or raising his voice doesn't automatically qualify, though if he was constantly shouting at the inexperienced players and making only them do the extra drills while emotionally blackmailing them over their spot in the team, I could see how they might take it as such.

But yeah, we just don't know. Need much more info to either condemn or exonerate him. 

Yep. Your post shows how difficult bullying is to define. Not sure what you mean by emotional blackmail over their spot in the team. It is a very emotive term to use. Again, I am genuinely interested in what constitutes this thing called ‘emotional blackmail.’ Can you provide an example? Surely it’s not “Until you are fit enough to compete for 90 minutes and stop making stupid mistakes, you won’t be selected.”

Are you saying that because bullying is difficult to define, no-one should ever be fired for bullying?

No, I’m asking those who say “if he bullied someone he should be sacked” to provide an example of such a sackable offence. Would you consider yourself to be bullied if the coach shouted at you in front of the team? If not, what would you consider bullying to be?
Or are you one of those who thinks any accusation “I was bullied” means an automatic sacking?

What is bullying

A worker is bullied at work if:

• a person or group of people repeatedly act unreasonably towards them or a group of workers
• the behaviour creates a risk to health and safety.

Unreasonable behaviour includes victimising, humiliating, intimidating or threatening. Whether a behaviour is unreasonable can depend on whether a reasonable person might see the behaviour as unreasonable in the circumstances.

Examples of bullying include:

• behaving aggressively
• teasing or practical jokes
• pressuring someone to behave inappropriately
• excluding someone from work-related events or
• unreasonable work demands.

What isn't bullying

A manager can make decisions about poor performance, take disciplinary action, and direct and control the way work is carried out. Reasonable management action that’s carried out in a reasonable way is not bullying.

Management action that isn't carried out in a reasonable way may be considered bullying.
https://www.fairwork.gov.au/employee-entitlements/bullying-and-harassment

“teasing or practical jokes”
If Stajcic was caught using whoopee cushions then I totally agree with the decision.

Save your time debating wot constitutes bullying etc, passing wind in church in the right circumstances would fit a criteria tbh. Fact is FFA are a workplace relations unit not a football body it would seem. Big on flavour of the month things like being inclusive, hug fest groups, joining ranks with eternally outraged groups etc, not pushing ball boys etc.

Until GALLOP & NIKOU come clean with some facts this is just more blood on the FFA doorstep. All we have to work with is they would have us believe that they have acted on wot the ‘Survey Assasins’ have said.

When Guus Hiddink took over, everyone fell in to line.  Several players who weren't first teamers became first teamers, some that expected to play didn't, he sat Schwarzer on the bench.

Verbeek picked who he wanted even in the face of criticism eg Holman.

Postecoglou.  Clearly he is a coach  who doe it his way or the highway. Someone who doesn't not give a fig about hurting anyone's feeling and is quite comfortable at completing clean outs of any challengers to his authority as he showed at Roar and with the Socceroos.

I wonder how the Matilda's would fair under these guys?

Or perhaps the truth is females needed to b treated differently to males?

What makes you so confident the problems are solely players unhappy at not being selected?

i didn't say that. But you think Guss, Pim and Ange would care whose feelings they hurt, or if anyone of the squad perceived them to have favourites?  All of them were very direct and frank in their communication. The palyers all fell in line.  They knew who was the boss. Ange even told Mooy he wasn't playing when Mooy was at the top of his game in the EPL (but had to play him due to injury.)  Mooy was pissed, but Ange didn't give a rats.

Decision defies all reasonable logic. You wouldn't fire Joachim Low midway to winning the World Cup.

I really do think they've made an example out of Stadjic for al the wrong reasons.

Good luck attracting a new quality coach to the Matilda’s......any potential candidates would be wondering if they are walking into the lions den.

Wouldn’t want to inadvertently step on any lionesses tail.....

But what's the relevance of that to the current issue? 

Next coach will have to sign an agreement saying he/she will consult with all players and ‘Our Watch’ on training schedules and selections. After consultation, a secret ballot will be held. In the event of a tied vote, Gallop will have the casting vote.

There have been suggestions of favouritism and bullying and black mail.  There is a lot of grey of what constitutes those things. Anyone of our previous mens WC coaches could be accused of of as behaving somewhere in the range.  Do you think any of them would care?

There is one glaring issue here: the results. Its a result-driven business.  The results were excellent and the squad had a genuine chance ta being World Champions.  That doesn't happen if the coach is universally hated by the playing group. 

The FFA would not have acted without complaint from some of the playing group.  They then  hired an independent "expert" to assess the validity of the claims.  They confirmed the claims had merit.  He was sacked.  It would be damaging for the FFA to admit that its head coach was doing things that may not sit well  in the the current political zeitgiest, even if the truth was that mens coaches would act in the same way and nothing would be done, so they say nothing.

Ergo my point that coaches may need to behave differently when coaching women.

Game time is for parents to debate with coaches and junior committees at 12s & 14 level lol. Professional sport is about winning.

You don’t see the Arabs sacking Warren Joyce when he puts a star in the grand stand. Man up FFA, or Woman up, wotever you prefer to call it in your corridors of power.

IF there’s as the American sport public call ‘Locker room cancers’ & ‘Coach Killers’ making a noise perhaps monitor that instead of trashing a WC campaign on the eve of the boils up.

But what makes you think that Staj has been acting the same way as the men's coaches you listed? You've pointed out that coaches like Ange have a "my way or the high way approach" which isn't an approach I disagree with, but I think you've also assumed that Staj has been fired for acting similarly, and I don't know what you're basing that on.

Saying that those men's coaches have acted "somewhere in the range" of bullying is a vague enough statement so as to be nearly useless, not to mention one I disagree with. I don't think being decisive in your decisions based on performance can be considered "in the range" of bullying by any logic. But even if how those men's coaches had behaved could be construed as in that range, just because actions most people think of as acceptable or innocuous can be categorised in a "range", doesn't mean all behaviours in that arbitrarily defined range are okay.

And I'd like to reiterate, we have so few details right now, that we can't categorise Staj's actions with any accuracy. So I don't understand how you've come to such a confident conclusion that his firing was unfair.

Enzo Bearzot

“ It would be damaging for the FFA to admit that its head coach was doing things that may not sit well in the the current political zeitgiest, even if the truth was that mens coaches would act in the same way and nothing would be done, so they say nothing.”

****

Good point. Nothing of this magnitude would come of these ‘surveys’ if he was coaching a men’s team....let alone surveys being conducted in the first place. Special snowflake princess treatment at its finest.