Arthur, the FFA are well aware of the narrow scope and limitations of the AIS and state teams. It is merely a stopgap measure till clubs have suitable development systems in place (which is the intention of the APL).




Edited by dimi: 14/11/2012 02:37:08 AM

Then shut up and learn. I have first hand experience.

Then shut up and learn. I have first hand experience. Politics and $$$ is everything here. Talent comes a distant last.

The sport here is buried in political bullshit and hype and more bullshit. Until this changes the sport will be in no one cares land as far as mainstream australia is concerned.

Edited by Aussiesrus: 14/11/2012 01:19:27 AM

That's all well and good and I'm glad to see passionate people around such as yourself, but you don't deserve the attention of anybody if you think those without the research or experience as yourself should just "shut up and learn." Everyone's entitled to their opinion, unless they're pigheaded. Those people should really not be in our game at all. I'd like to hope that you're not one of them.

I can't comment on the political side of any of this stuff as I have absolutely no involvement and have never had any involvement in a behind the scenes form in the game in Australia. The only thing I can comment on is the results (or lack of) of the pathways. All my experience is in the UK and Scandinavia.

First and foremost; Yes, the pathways are producing players. There are some issues though.

a) I don't believe it has been long enough to judge the pathways system on the current crop of young players. The gap between the NSL and A-League and subsequent shake up put things off for a long time. Just looking at where ALL of the youngsters come from proves this - None are from A-League clubs originally, which leads to point b.

b) The pathways are enforced by 99% amateurs, not professionals, no matter how many "badges" they may hold. Let's keep in mind that no club has a real academy - Without creating a real academy, the only thing they can do now is to scout lower league players (doesn't that say something in itself, lower league?). Leads onto point c.

c) The pathways system will never completely succeed until every professional club has a fully functional academy and youth pathway system. It may seem kind of obvious, but when there is a team (coaches/management) whose sole job it is, is to increase on-field, off-field and financial success for the club in the long term, they will be more committed and will be held to stricter guidelines, expectations and the like. Every young player coming through now is essentially trained in "Sunday league school" up until the age of 16 where they may get a NYL contract - Which brings in the whole idea of politics as well.

From my experience overseas and from what I've seen and heard in Australia, there is a pretty decent difference between how and why players get selected. Youth football in Australia is more reminiscent of in the USA than in Europe - ie; middle class, white families with "soccer moms", and the selection policy and contractual policy of professional clubs (Youth sides) probably points to this.

In the UK and Sweden, none of this even comes into play. If a player is good enough, he's good enough - His parents don't pay for him to trial, why would they? Why would parents pay to get their child into a position where the club will pay him? That's ridiculous. Does anyone think that Cristiano Ronaldo, Ronaldinho or Messi ever paid a club just to be looked at? What about the entire Senagalese team? No? Oh, but in Australia, clubs have trial days where hundreds upon hundreds get looked at for 4 hours, while paying ludicrous amounts of money?

Another problem is distance. With professional clubs separated by so much distance, there comes great risk with who a club offers a contract to. In Europe, there are hundreds if not thousands of professional clubs within only 200km of each other. We have 10. One in another country and another 2000km away from the nearest club.

So, let's say you're in a position to hand NYL contracts out. Let's say you can offer 20 contracts, a brand new side. There are 30 kids vying to get them. All the kids are between 15 and 17, and just for arguments sake, let's say you're based with Perth Glory.

22 kids are from Perth.
17 of these are from stable families whose parents support their kids as much as they can and have been around the local Perth footballing scene their whole lives.
5 of these are from immigrant families with a single parent who works long hours and can't get her child to training and matches every week.

4 kids are from regional Western Australia and have driven and flown in to take parts in trials. Their parents can't make it because they are back home working and looking after the house/family/etc.

4 kids have come interstate from over 2000km away with their families, all to try and earn that first NYL contract. Their parents can't relocate.

So. Who would you guys be more likely to select for a contract? Maybe it's just me, but logistically, the answer is already obvious.

how many AIS graduates go on to play a-league or socceroo level, compared to CCM? that's the real test, the finishing position in the NYL and a "losing culture" is a null point if the AIS has more.

Arthur, the FFA are well aware of the narrow scope and limitations of the AIS and state teams. It is merely a stopgap measure till clubs have suitable development systems in place (which is the intention of the APL).

Edited by dimi: 14/11/2012 02:37:08 AM

M.L.

Much of what you describe is common. I can relate to it all. Have seen it all. And the whole thing leaves me disgusted. I think a big problem is that clubs are fighting for survival and their survival is cash based. Who is going to tell the 50k or 100k sponsor his kid isn't good enough? Who is going tell the chairman, coach or president etc etc their kid isn't good enough? Cash from FFA should be filtered down not milked up.

My lad has been at an academy for 2 years (Australasian Soccer Academy) Trained and played with A-League, J-League, Olyroos, NYL players, EPL juniors, gave up a years playing to train with a top flight NSWPL club, won countless division 1 titles in row. Yet now at 18 almost 19 he cannot even obtain a place in a premier 2 U/20's side despite going to around 10 trials in the last 3-4 weeks. He worked his arse off for the last 3 years day and nights and when it came time for his reward had it ripped from him. He is at the point where he just shrugs his shoulders and says it's not my problem it's theirs. Top kid.

I have given so much of myself through coaching over the years and have seen many brilliant outstanding kids who would absolutely run rings around todays youth and the sad thing is I look them up today to see they have given up the sport because the system has let them down. Such a waste of brilliant talent. Todays youth are not even a shred of the talent that i've seen and had the pleasure of coaching in the past.

It's a sad fact there is the inner circle and there is the outer circle. Talent has nothing to do with any of it.

You are now where I was about 6-7 years ago. I wish I could say things have changed but they have not. Still I wish you the best of luck for your lad. My lad will now retire from football at the age of 18 and carry into his generation with his kids the same resentment of the sport for his next generation.

It is my personal experience watching my lad trial for the last 3 years that these open trials are a complete waste of your time. They already know prior who they will pick and why. I had hoped 30 years on from my days the sport had changed. It hasn't. Just new faces reproducing the same rubbish but nowdays the only thing that has changed is the way they market the bullshit. Spin doctoring for the gullible.

Here is a weird irony that I will share. The higher the level my lad trialed the closer he came to being signed, meaning he would reach the last 20-25 out of over 150 players. The lower the level he trialed with only IE: 25 players he was cut instantly. What does this tell you? I conclude if you are from outside the circle lad your must be good enough to carry the political duds and make them look good at higher levels. At lower levels they simply have no idea in any case which is why they are lower level. Lower levels are like a rotor lactor of idiots.

Don't ever let any dickhead tell you, you are just a parent who's kid failed. It is not the kid who fails or you as a parent. It is the system and the bunch of dickheads making it a one sided no win situation.

We all love the sport of football in it's purist form. Nothing better. It's the dickheads screwing it up for everyone else that seem to take pleasure in doing so simply because they can.

Kharma has a funny way of giving back to them what they deserve ;)

Edited by Aussiesrus: 14/11/2012 01:28:40 AM

I know of kids that were deemed not good enough for local reps here but have been signed by EPL clubs like Man city and Stoke. Nike second chance player who was also not deemed good enough to play state level is now a-league.

@Thupercoach

The pathway has become so narrow there no longer is room for talent. Only the politically well connected kids are allowed to walk that pathway. Fix this and you will fix a lot of problems with the sport.

Need I say more?

AIS kids are handed a free ticket to wear the green and gold. Some of them do not even have clubs and I know one who played 20 mins total football in the NSWPL season at U/20 level and was handed a green and gold jersey, He was not deemed good enough to play 1st grade in NSWPL yet according to the system he is good enough to play for Australia.

Interesting point about the player overlooked for state league playing HAL! Are you at liberty to disclose the name of the player?

It also gets back to the point I make about opinions varying so much from coach to coach based on differing knowledge bases and different criteria determining who or what constitutes a good player. This can be exemplified in coaches evaluation of a forward struggling to score goals in a winning team. The opinions often vary.

Tom Rogic.

The pathway is designed to exclude players of this calibre with real talent. The pathway has a filtering system eliminating the best thus leaving the average to walk down the pathway with no real opposition. This is why we end up with highly trained average players and not highly trained talented players.

Our golden generation was not born of the current system. They were products prior to the current system. When they finally retire the senior side will fall back into the void of not qualifying for world cups, olympics and Asia will simply leave us to end up a backwater 3rd rate asian football country.


Edited by Aussiesrus: 14/11/2012 01:48:52 PM

This is where the FFA system lets us down compared to the past because a late developer like Rogic who wasn't a standout at 14 or 15 is going to be missed. In the past Joeys selections began at 16 and AIS at 17 so that extra year or 2 can make a big difference. Remember Bresciano didn't make a Victorian team until he was 16 and then went straight to AIS and then on to be one of our best ever. The current system would completely miss him because if you haven't made your state team by 14 its almost impossible to make a Joeys or AIS.

The pathway is designed to exclude players of this calibre with real talent. The pathway has a filtering system eliminating the best thus leaving the average to walk down the pathway with no real opposition. This is why we end up with highly trained average players and not highly trained

Edited by Aussiesrus: 14/11/2012 01:48:52 PM

I think it's a pretty narrow view to talk about 'the pathway' when all of the discussion above shows that there are in fact many different pathways that a player can take to become a pro. And over and over again it has been said that the FFA also thinks the current options are too narrow and that the HAL and APL clubs are where the development (academies) should be.

And in the best programmes in the world there will always be early and late developers who confound the system and this, to some, becomes the 'proof' that the system isn't working.

Your confusing official FFA pathways as opposed to unofficial backdoors. Nike second chance is not an official pathway, It was a back door. Neither is the backdoor for late bloomers which CCM recognises should be left open. CCM deserve a lot of credit for cutting through the crap and ignoring the system where applicable whereas many other clubs will accept nothing except the system.

Clearer for you now?

Amazing!!!!!

Wow, Rogic is such a good player, he is almost peerless in ability. To think he wasn't selected for NSWPL is a massive problem. To think there could be other players of this ability, who are unknown, is frightening!

Australian Coerver use him as their pin up graduate. I can't believe Jason Lanscar, Aussie head of Ceorver, wasn't waxing lyrical about him the media before we saw him for CCM. JL is also friendly with Han Berger.

How did CCM acquire him?

Who from CCM saw him?

Mabbout was identified by another coach in the Victory system, not Ange. We are isolated in Tassie, but we now have a close relationship with Victory and their coaching staff, fostered by state FFA. Many other coaches and TDs in Tassie seem to have little interest in the HAL, so I can usually fire a lot of questions at them at conferences/clinics.

Tassie stakeholders seem most interested in the UEFA CL the EPL and Serie A.



Edited by Decentric: 14/11/2012 12:49:36 PM

The only future for a player with skill is overseas.All i can say is concentrate on football and make the break as soon as possible.

Arthur,

1. At U/12's the coaches have no idea what will be talent at U/18's, Their choices have nothing to do with talent.

2. The sides don't change much up to U/18's simply for political reasons, chairman, president, coach, power brokers, ex-socceroos kids.

Mate wake up and smell the roses. As much as I love yours and Decentrics passion the reality is far removed from the truth. Please do not bury this topic in systematic babble.

In other words, I don;t really know the system when it comes to the young kids. A number of you on here have absolutely trashed it and for the above reason I won;t disagree with you.

@ those of you who criticised it, what needs to change? And how should this change be implemented? Serious question - no point bitching unless you have a solution. And how difficult would that change be to implement?

how many AIS graduates go on to play a-league or socceroo level, compared to CCM? that's the real test, the finishing position in the NYL and a "losing culture" is a null point if the AIS has more.

Arthur, the FFA are well aware of the narrow scope and limitations of the AIS and state teams. It is merely a stopgap measure till clubs have suitable development systems in place (which is the intention of the APL).




Edited by dimi: 14/11/2012 02:37:08 AM

Interesting.:-k

One thing I don't like about the NTC system, is that elite players start to perceive themselves as elite.

Hence, elitist attitudes can manifest.

The young Victory player who scored twice against Roar is an an interesting case. There may have been perceptions he was 'hidden' or advised not to pursue the FFA pathway.

Sometimes coaches can be so selfish, they will stand in player's way to play at a higher level, if that player can be used in a coach winning a title at a lower level.