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.

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!

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

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.

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!

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.

What do you mean has become?

Who the fuck is that directed at??

Foster "becoming" a joke.

He became a joke back at Crystal Palace...it takes the news a little longer to filter through to some than others.

Has become a complete joke.

The technical level of NSL may have been better due to the slower pace of the game back then, thats what Fozz is craving for.He hates the EPL style.

I suggest before you make 'foster' like stupid remarks, you read the thread in full.



Whats the BMW got to do with it?

Afro, you should become a politician, you would be good at it, (only showing half the picture, the half that suits your needs) you would get paid for that and may even be given a BMW with a driver.

The same EPL he as head football analyst refuses to watch?

Just quick point on Erebus comment the crowds only go to see mariners because they are winning. They have won 1 out of 7 i think even though the last 3 mariners home games all topped each other for crowd numbers they were all losses. Punters and fans go for the excitement and enjoyment of the game which to some iws the technical excellence fossie aspire to. But for mine i think its a bit of sour grapes???

So you think Fossie aspires to technical excellence?

Why is that? You think Fossie or anybody else at SBS care about the future of the game in this country?

Is there a single time, just a single f****n time, that anyone at SBS in the days of the old NSL, expressed a view of what was wrong with the game then and how to fix it?

Do you understand the concept of, from being the exclusive "sokka station", thanks to the limited market the ethnic teams created, to being an outsider in the new football world of the A-League, really means to SBS people?

Just think: Would SBS be better off if "sokka" went back to the old NSL days, when they were the one and only football station or not? Has the A-League f****d them up completely or not?

Then remember this: Fossie works for SBS. He gets paid to be negative. Treat the spastic the way he deserves.

Read the thread in full?? Half the fucking posts in this thread are me!! :lol:

It was a sublte allusion to the fact taht he gets paid for his opinion, i'll be more blunt next time for your benefit.

I've been told that before, but I don't like public speaking so much.

Foster aspires to technical excellence?? When did that come to be? If that were the case then he would have been a far better player.

You mean side from "The National team is doing shit...we need a better coach."...ah...no.

You do seem a little paranoid there though ton.of.bricks.

No politician is good enough to deserve a BMW, they're all stuck with Caprices (or whatever Holden... *waits for correction*)

Caprice or Statesman, depends on the paycheck.

afroman do you always overule everyone else comments[-x

When it suits him. If the situation doesn't warrant a response beyond an arbitrary threshold for the growth of his ego, he won't respond. But, being the tight-arse he is, that threshold is apparently very low. So, yes.

only when there's a chance of getting a response like that one.

Fuck you marty. You're guilty of doing exactly the same thing with that comment you hypocrit :lol:

8-[:-"

Fossie spoke at a coaches group meeting in our area a few months back & was generally very well received - until he bagged out Arnie who I believe is seen as a former local. His passion & love for the game was obvious. His articles on youth development are worth reading.
He is filling an important role in the development of our game - "keeping the bastards honest" - he is opinionated, controversial & abrasive, isn't that what is needed for healthy debate? You can love him or hate but he is an important cog! It would be exceptionally boring without him.

Fossie has not even atained a junior coaching liscence. At least when Breeze speaks at the refs meetings he has the qualifications to do so. It is rather contradictory that he insults the league standard but does nothing to help it.

Guest wrote:

Fossie has not even atained a junior coaching liscence. At least when Breeze speaks at the refs meetings he has the qualifications to do so. It is rather contradictory that he insults the league standard but does nothing to help it.

Fossie couldn't even improve Nerds FC when he was looking after them. They went from bad to worse and forgot the little they knew about the game by the time he finished with them.

But there's hope. Fossie is having a go at the standard of play in the A-League because there are no many negatives to find in the A-League at the moment. The crowds are huge, the tv ratings are great, Fossie must be getting frustrated trying to find issues to whinge about.

Wow all this Fozzie bashing really makes me laugh. Everybody wants to talk about how negative he is and how much he whinges...

"This season won't be remembered for its quality of football but when crowds are up and good kids are coming through the ranks, there's always tremendous hope for the future."

Hmmmmm yes they sound exactly like the words of a man who hates the league and is conspiring to take Aussie football back to the days of the NSL so SBS can be the sole football network once again. #-o
Come on guys it would be reasonable to actually listen to someones opinion before you decide to rip into it.

Besides the only thing he 'whinges' about is that the technical quality of Aussie football isn't yet at a level where we can compete with the best on the world stage (I think most would agree with that at this stage)and that he is worried that we aren't yet going in the right direction. That is why he attacked Ange, Butcher, Arnie etc and judging from past comments made here most of us agree that those guys weren't up to scratch. I can understand why hes not everyone's cup of tea because sometimes he does get carried away but a lot of what he says is actually quite true if you really listen and don't just write him off as mad straight away.

He had no place to attack any of them. He is only following the SBS mould though I guess. Remember Venables coaching Australia. Yeah nearly took us to a WC bar for that cock sucking serial pest.... what do SBS do... campaign to have him fired. They just want the A-League to fail so they can get their biggest rating show back on.
Everybody is entitled to their opinion, but there is such a thing as oversaturation, especially with such an undermining and poorly thought through opinion. It's all very well to say "The a-league isn't good enough" but he's not doing anything to improve it, and when he DOES make a suggestion, it's always foolhardy, most probably because he doesn't have ANY coahces bardges and has no idea what hes' on about. There are people on this forum who have better knowledge and better developed opinions that Craig Foster has.

Fozzie insults other countries such as England, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, France and Hungarian acadamies but refuses to realise how these academies fit better into the Australian culture and will produce better players from this country. These players are also better team players as they come up as a unit. They learn team play and self sacrafice for the better of the team. The German, Italian, Dutch and English club sides work much better as a unit than the Spanish sides who rely on individual brilliance to carry a team (ie: Torres at Atletico Madrid or the Los Galacticos hoping that the star or in the case of Los Galacticos one of the many stars fires on the day). When was the last time you saw a Spanish team win a game on the back of a solid team performance?

The Brazilian development system puts children as young as 9 years old under immense pressure. These children literally fight for positions in the team. They go out their with the mentality that they must win and at all costs. They are brought up with a mentality that the harder they tackle the more likely they are to hamper the other players chances. This is why the disciplinary record of Brazilian players is far from perfect. Roberto Carlos was on the reciving end of more than his fair share of cards for example as were fellow fullback Emerson and Cafu. They all recieved higher than average carding.

Foster plays up the brazilians and latin americans as so brillaint, but what he fails to realise is that many of the players that we accept as "brilliant Brazilians" come from middle class ro affluent families. players like Ricardo Izecson dos Santos Liete, Ronaldo de Assís Moreira, Elano Blumer, Frederico Chaves Guedes, Antônio Augusto Ribeiro Reis Júnior are all incredible players, but they haven't had to fight tooth and nail for a way out of the lifestyle they lead. We hear about the clubs like Sao Paulo and Atletico Paranaense that belch out quality players, but clubs like Figueirense can hardly afford the fascilities they have got.

These players after coming up through the academy become egotistical and self important. Rivaldo for a start caused many a player to leave the club he was at. He had to always be the star of the show, never the bridesmade, never taking a back seat, it was always about the necessity for him to prove his brilliance rather than that of the club and the brilliance of the team working as a whole and heaven help us if someone else put in a better performance.

Also when was the last time you saw Ronaldo chase down a pass that has gone askew. He has to have the ball at his feet or chest, not his head, not for him to run onto. It has to go to him, otherwise he is not going to chase it. Exactly the same with Romario. (has he gone bald yet?). On the other hand you have strikers like Klose, Luca Toni, van Persie, Johnson, Saha and now the upcomers like Giovinco and Rossi coming out of Italy, Caroll from England, Gomez from Germany and Babel, John and even Huntelaar for The Dutch. They all have a top class workrate and will chase every ball down.


Sanctioned by afroman.

Talk yourself up :roll:. Then again, you're just confirming what we all already suspect :P - oh the irony!

That I am better than Craig Foster \:d/