Who the fuck is that directed at??

What do you mean has become?

but then there would be disputes over who gets whom and the FFA can't really afford it.

You can't sell a player to a rival A-League club.

Between you and me, Stevie wasn't coaching england :-$
England aren't really known for their die hard attitude. The Germans showd that it can be done that way though.

There's more. Just their names escape me at the moment.

YEAH!! all we had to do was beat Germany and France and we that trophy was ours!! you keep telling yourself that mate. We weren't robbed. It was foolish of Neill to give Grosso somehting to trip over, especially since he knew the italian's reputation. And we should have killed the game off well before then, italy had 10 men FFS!! But this is all coming up to two years ago, get over it.

The difference being that we don't get paid for the privilage and don't drive a BMW.

He has a point though, since we seem to be talking about what could have happened.
Australia could have beat Italy in a penalty shootout. That was the only way though, but they could have done it. Dont know how we would have gone against the Frogs though!
Still, if my Aunty had balls she'd be my Uncle!

I did not say that I believed Australia deserved to win the game, I said Italy were lucky to have done so.

I totally agree, Neil should not have lunged in, infact Bresciano should never have let him get there in the first place. However, I disagree that Neil made contact with him, he made contact with Neil and new exactly what he was upto. If the same scenario had happened at the other end it would be the Italians that would have been screaming about how hard done by they were. Unfortunately, thats football and Australia has to add that side of the game to their repitoir.

My point is that flair and technical ability does not guarantee success. A couple of seasons ago Arsenal won the FA cup on penalties (which they clearly played for) because they were not in the same league as their opponents on the day (and no I am not a Man U fan) in that area and did not deserve to win based on the ninety minutes + 30 minutes extra time.

However, this is the beauty of a cup competition, it is based on the day and a lucky break could fall to either team.

You are truly an idiot. Nothing you ever post now will have any sort of relevance or creedence. You are part of the Australian Football fan that i despise.

Can you please tell me how many goal scoring chances Australia presented themselves with in that game. You cannot include Chipperfields shot, because he kicked it straight at Buffon's chest.

I challenge you to field a complete argument as to why we deserved to win that game and why Neil was not a dickhead for going down in the box. Watch the replay again. Mighty Lucas lifts his arms into his legs, knocking him down.

Douche

What a load of bollocks! How many teams in the last few world cups have got close to getting into the finals with a team of 'no names'?

There is alot to be said for talented players, but a team of talented players may not make a team.

Greece were given no chance in the last Euro's prior to the tournament (not sure what their starting odds were, but there was a bloke in the UK that got 150-1 on a 100K wager, so it was at least that) and guess what happened? They won it!

Was it the talent that took them past the might of Europe? No, a belief in themselves a never say die attitude and bloody hard work.

But for a dodgy penalty, Australia may have won the world cup, because the team that got that dodgy penalty DID!

Back to the original topic - Foster........... He does what he is paid to do, provide an opinion and because it is an opinion it neither right nor wrong and open to be questioned, just like everyones opinion on this site!

As I have said before, without Foster in that role and others like him, the 'topics' we discuss on here would be thinner on the ground.

Although I do think he is a PLANK!

Fosters comments do at times annoy the shit out of me , sometimes he makes sence , but the 1 thing that is a definite is sbs's sour grapes towards the A-leauge in particular and oz foot ball in general after they los the rights to matches , les murray's comments are soo funny the guy has to let go.

which is kind of the point - they failed to even make Euro 2008 with exactly that approach. In any case they both possess other skills - the coaches i am reffering to basically were trying to be positive. Both the squads you mention are quality anyway, regardless of their failing play.

Hernandez hasnt left yet, its up to victory if they keep him for the second year of his loan, dunno about 10 but here are some:

Carle, Carney, Fred, Milton Rodrigues, Okon(yeah he retired but still needs to be replaced), Fernando Rech(again he retired, Leijer, Beauchamp(Season 1) and i guess you could sort of count Vidosic but he was replaced through Roars youth this year.

Thats 9 so far might think of some more later.

In the case of centralised contracts to which i refer the players would be contracted to the FFA and farmed out to clubs. So yes they would.


10 quality players? Fred, Carle, possibly Hernandez and Carney (who actually left this season) the others would be who?


The present economic reality says we must be (for the time being).


So you agree with me then [sarcasm]. Case in point Burns will walk from Adelaide more than likely for nothing this year. Adelaide also let a contracted player in Owens leave the club last year only to sign with the Mariners, good business that. Carney? (So there may have been a clause there but it was a ridiculous one). Of course you are going to get players leaving on frees, you don't have to make it any easier by signing them to one and two year contracts. They are the clubs' only useful assets so sign them for longer (the really talented ones that is), if the Europeans want them that bad they can pay the going rate.

They dont' need to be, they're only mediating. Not paying the marquee player's wage.

It's all about knowing where to look. Industries which are looking to be advertising at the time the games are played are more likely to come aboard (eg food companies).

...or have an arrest warrant issued by the Thai government. But that's just a part of private ownership of clubs, how often does that actually happen?

How many quality players were lost last year?? about 10-ish?? and how many quality players have been 'discovered' this season??...about 5 or 6...you do the maths.

So we what? leave things the way they are? players continue to be poached by overseas clubs (and as word spreads this will happen more and more often). We should not be content with being a feeder league for the major leagues in europe.

Not when players leave on a bosman because the clubs aren't offering them enough and they can get ten times as much over in England or Spain. Don't be so short sighted.

Centralised contracts for marquee players have been talked about before. It probably would be the best method if you want to go with multiple marquees, alhough the FFA is hardly flushed with cash themselves. Having the clubs manage it themselves is fraut with danger though. Finding the cash would be largely reliant upon generous benefactors in the form of the club owners. Major sponsers still seem a bit hard to come by, given that it took the Roar the biggest part of three seasons to come up with a front of shirt sponser. The problem with relying on the owners chequebook is that they may become bored with their new toy, get investigated by the ATO or drop dead and then you are in it deep.
I'm not saying your ideas are bad ones, just in my opinion it is a bit early in the day. I also don't mind losing a few players along the way as long as there is a stronger league in 10 years time. Besides I'm optimistic the league can renew itself with more quality youngsters like the Burns and Djite of last year and the Zullo and Kruse of this without breaking the bank.
What the clubs do need to wake up to is that they are operating in a World marketplace, signing players to short term contracts and letting them walk away for little or nothing isn't going to get us anywhere. Start demanding decent transfer fees and then the wage problem certainly lessens.

I think I may have reada n extra zero in there then...Fred at Lyon is on closer to 80k a week for the record.

The FFA should have designated Marquee contracts so they can police how much is being poured into these players coffers in an attempt to save said hangings. some clubs wouldn't be able to afford the 500k, which is why changing the Marquees is better, there are a lot of players out there and there has got to be atleast one quality player who can fill the marquee slot for the club that's not going to cost them something they can't afford.

Afroman-My post was sortof referring to Mr Magoo's comments not yours, i only saw yours after i submitted mine.

Fred on 50k a week?Not unless your talking about the one in france, fred is getting paid 222k(USD) a year by DC united.

MrMagoo- maybe to stop the clubs "hanging"themselves there should be a cap of 500k? on the second and third marquee spots or the FFA would have to approve a signing before one is made, based on a clubs financial situation, the source of the money required and their ability to actually pay the salary.

No, I'm talking about ONE Juninho. One Australian Marquee (eg Archie Thompson) who's on less. And then if the clubs want a third marquee then they can have that.

actually, he's on 50k a week isn't he?

This is because they have aspirations of becoming a european powerhouse *glares at Leeds United* I think it's fairly safe to say that this isn't going to be an issue here. The clubs aren't stupid enough to run themselves that far into the red and the FFA won't let that happen, they keep tabs on all the clubs as is.

I can see where you are coming from. Not convinced it would work though, give them enough rope and they will hang themselves. Far bigger clubs than ours have run themselves into the ground. Only way you could ensure that wouldn't happen would be to put a ceiling on spending, and then it wouldn't be a marquee system would it.

Youre talking about clubs buying 3 Juninho's at the one time and having to pay 3 million a year plus normal players.

I think that having multiple marquee slots would be more for keeping players that have grown in stature but dont fit into the cap anymore, like the situation with fred, he was lost because Victory couldnt fit 222k into the cap, or just recruiting better players than Leandro Love.

Extra Marquee spots would allow this.

I don't know about the rest of the clubs but Melbourne is in the black I understand. The clubs aren't stupid, they dont' have to have the marquee spots filled, they aren't mandatory so if they can't afford it, they probably won't fill it.

If a club cant' afford atleast one marquee it probably shouldn't be in the league.
We have a league of haves and havenots already. Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide have. Wellington and Perth havenot. (sorry QLD, SSM and Newie, but i'm not quite sure what you fall into yet)

You'd certainly hope that there would be some players taht would be able to be retained, otherwise we're condemned to forever being a minor league from which other large european leagues syphoning off players.

I don't have the figures but I'd be surprised if any of the clubs are even at break even. How are they going to afford it?


That is indeed the problem, how are they going to pay for them? True, filling the spots wouldn't be compulsory but surely not doing so, or not being able to afford to do so, would create a league of haves and have nots. Which may be fine down the track but when you are trying to establish markets and build a league it would be wise to retain some level of parity.


Seriously are we going to be able to stop that anyway? If they are good enough we can't compete in a price war. Unless you are talking about clubs carrying a squad of 15 to save some cash to splash on 3 marquees.

But we all know how that would end...

That's the point in raising the salary cap, so that they can be payed more to remove some of the allure of playing overseas so they stop poaching our tallent.

if we raised the salary cap we would still just be paying the same players more money because we already have the best australian players, its not like there is a bunch of higher quality players stuck in the vpl because there isnt enough money to buy them. also it is the australian league, we dont want squads full of second hand brazilians who just come here for money and to flaunt their fancy names. imo it would be better to have another marquee player so there is two or three per club. that would also help us do well in the asian champions league which would bring a profit no matter how much you payed your marquee player.

craig foster isnt a joke hes a bitter old man, hes jealous that simon hill, andrew orsatti and branko culina have had better jobs than his after being in the same position as fozzie himself a couple of years ago. what cuts him up the most though is that the man he verbally bashed on air ange postecoglu also has a job at fox sports. no doubt he google searches his name every night when he gets home to see who disagrees with him. hes probably signed up to fourfourtwo under the name "fozziereadyandwaitingforabetterjob" just so he can defend himself.
pity the only thing he can back himself up with is that he is leading the world game footy tipping, what a hero.

I support Fossies latest comments - The crowds are growing, but the techical side is somewhat lacklastre. Pim Verbeek noticed this after 1 week of the A-league.

However, I feel Foster goes too far sometimes. It is like the man is all negative. He should remember the European club took along time to grow into what they are now. In the meanwhile, the Euro or South American leagues and the technical abilities of the players took along time too, to develop.
The A-league is 3 years old - it has just been born and trying to find its legs in the world. The finer detail regarding techique/skill will take a while yet.

In the past, Foster has often spoken about the level of coaching. Although i admit the coashing is not the best - and certain measures should be taken to improve the standard. Foster seems to voice his opinions and then hide behind the cameras. To be honest, I would love to see him take on a managerial role - given he has the answer to everything, and is able to criticise the poor standard of technique. Maybe he can improve the quality.

In reference to Technique - the following players are Shit/RUBBISH:
Ian Fyfe
Terry McFlynn

Why thankye. They leat you could have done is quote the whole sentence though. I think fat frank said something similar too...

:lol: Post of the month right there :lol:

I used to respect you until you made that post and made it public that it took you so long to realise he's a complete tosspot.

Even still, it's incredibly hypocritical for him to be saying some of the things he said when he doesn't have a coaching lisence himself.

Stevie Gerrard would disagree with that, he's said it is the way to win a WC...The Germans did it that way too.

To Craig Foster, everything is of a poor standard bar his beloved spain. Italy: "...below the standards of today and far from waht it used to be both on the pitch and off it...", England: [too many quotes to mention], The club world championship, Germany: "...not up to the standard of the rest of europe, there are a couple of teams that can run with the likes of Real Madrid but that's only really Bremen and Bayern Munich."...and then he throws in the A-League for good measure.

why? the guy gave his opinion on a crap coach who had been left in an important position for far too long. Yes maybe he could have been more professional, but clearly this was just his passion for the game and the Aussie colours taking over. He hated seeing that nothing seemed to be done to fix our failing coaches. Its not acceptable what Ange was getting away with.

O and the quality has fallen, that seems pretty clear to me...

I don't see why people always attack Foster when he says the A-league is poor standard. Any major coach or whatever who has come here has said that the Australian game is a physical game with a never say die attitute. That won't win you a world cup.

I used to respect Foster as a media pundit,but ever sice he had that "disscussion" with Ange Postegoglu(howeva u spell it)on SBS,the guy is a NOB.

Howso?

I thought that the Franchise lisencing fee bought the team a loan on wages for the squad for the season, it was just down to how they pay for the marquees that was the club's problems.
As for how the club deals with Marquees, that's up to them isn't it, it's not compulsary to fill the marquee player's slot.

In the mean time clubs lose players to overseas poachers who can offer larger contracts or because they can't fit all their players under the salary cap.