In the last ten years we have qualified for all but two U-17 World Cups, and all but one U-20 World Cups.

Since moving to Asia, however, we have only qualified to one of a potential 4 of these tournaments.

Let's wait and see how those teams go against the seeded teams in their groups before we start making comparisons. There's a big fucking difference between Germany on the one hand and Slovakia, Greece and Cameroon on the other. Pretty sure it's much easier to have belief against them than the top seeded team. I'd have liked our team to show more spirit and fight too, it was awful, but let's not just lose ourselves in the doom and gloom and hype.

Now North Korea against Brazil. That was impressive. As long as the players can turn it around and show belief against Ghana and Serbia, which they should do, then move on. If they play with fear again and no belief...then fine, we can all blame Pim or whatever.

Verbeek's A-League comments have to be taken in context. He's asked time and time again early on why he doesn't pick A-League players and why he picks someone like say, Josh Kenndey over which ever A-League wonder-boy scored a goal last week. So he answers the question honestly. So the guy's not diplomatic. Whatever. It's not like he's come out, convened a press conference and gone on a rant about how sit the A-League is. And you know what...he was probably right as well. Craig Moore (not a favourite I know) and other returning players have said the same thing (in the print 442 no less) that the intensity in training is way off European standard.

A coach that can shape what we have now coming through is important. I keep coming back to Troussier. Whoever it is needs to show well at the Asian Cup and qualify us again for Brasil.

The amount of people in the past few days saying, no worries, we'll be better in Brasil 2014 have no idea. They think qualification is automatic, we'll be lucky to qualify with the resurgence of the West Asian teams that is pending.

Looks like this is where the problem commenced and we are paying for it now

From what I can tell, there is a rift in the camp but it is about a few players personalities, nothing whatsoever to do with Pim or his tactics. I think we will hear about this after the World Cup and it will explain a lot but now is not the time to dig it up, it just has to be managed as best as possible. That is what the coach is doing. I am sure that he is best placed to deal with it, not us armchair critics or passionate football analysts and he is dealing with problems that we know nothing about from the outside.

As for Fossie's outburst, well I haven't been able to view it yet but I have read it's content.
I respect his passion & knowledge for Australian football but in this case his heart has overuled his head.

We all know what message it sends when you get the opposition fighting among themselves. Well, it's not a good look & you know that you have got them beaten. Think about international squads that regularly implode, Holland, some of the Balkan states, well do we want that to be us?
Only nutcases sack coaches mid tournament. We are better than that, we need to stick it out & show faith.
After the World Cup is over we can re-assess & learn from our mistakes & make decisions for the future.
I am pretty sure that if another nation did what Fossie advocated then he would look down his nose at them and think they were crackpots.
We picked a coach, let him do his job.

I agree with Fossie though re our players,( other than Moore ). They are good enough to do well there but they simply did not do their jobs properly the other night against Germany. They will bounce back & regroup but the loss was mainly the players fault, not the coach. Forget the last 2 goals, the game was lost at 2 - 0 when Cahill got himself sent off . At that stage there was no point bringing on Kewell or even Kennedy. He brought on our two most mobile players, Holman & Ruka to run & chase & cover ground to make up for only having 10 men.

We only had 3 players that played okay, Emerton was our best. We can't beat Germany playing with 10 men for half a game when we are already 2 - 0 down. Germany played better than any other team so far & they have had months of practice with the Adidas Jabalani balls. Has any other team got their shots on target like the Germans? No.

Germany would have beaten any other team in that game. Other Asian teams have done okay 1st up but who have they played? No-one like Germany, our results will pick up & so will our play. The other Asian teams will drop off when they come up against top quality opposition.

The difference between Australia and the other Asian Countries in the WC, along with NZ, is belief. NZ's coach did not slag off their local league and has them play an attacking style. Contrast that with Verbeek who is quick to label players as 'absolutely hopeless', demeans the A-League as rubbish and plays the most negative football imaginable. South Korea and Japan also have belief and a positive attitude, and the results have come for them.

In short, Australia's lack of success is due to Verbeek's negativity and his lack of belief that Australia can play attacking football and match it with the best. That sort of attitude produces shitty results, and it's deserving - we deserve the thrashing result we got for hiring a negative clown like Verbeek

I've been thinking about the good performances of Japan and South Korea too, and it definitely puts our's in perspective. To that you can add NZ's performance. Three different styles, but all better results. It is indeed an interesting comparison.

But I don't agree with your negativity about the youth coming through the A-League.

And Les, Okon. Kimon is good too but he was better in the Lion King.

=d> =d> =d> Agree 100%. With all this panicking, no wonder the FFA are having trouble finging a replacement coach. Must be the toughest Coaching job ever trying to please a country full of experts.

=d> =d> =d> =d> =d>

West Ham was just one answer.

You have heard of Paul Scholes, David Beckham, The Neville brothers, Nicky Butt, Wes Brown ? All came through the Man Utd Academy.

As for Foz, he is paid to be a pundit on SBS and does a very good job. Witness all you people scrambling for links.

Aside from Australia, two Asian nations won and the other lost due to a freak goal to Brazil, which is a further indictment on Pim's tactics at the World Cup.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.....this has got to be the stupidist thing i have ever read...

1) so its fine to go in there expecting to lose, who gives a shit that we lost, we expected it. hey let them score 6 goals why not, we dont expect to win.

worst fucking attitude ever.

2) losing 4-0 is going to turn off every supporter.

3) well arent you dumb. backinga guy who just lost 4-0 over a guy who is making the most sense right now.

4) yeah, we qualified top of asia, but lets face it, the opposition were crap quality. we got shown for what we are and have been under verbeek against germany. we could easily have lost more games in qualifying but we played weak opposition.

i respect foster for saying this. its right, pim has messed us up and set us back.

With regard to the team not training the day afterwards, I believe they had an afternoon/evening training session, but most of the day was wiped out because they only left to go back to their training camp at 6am due to a problem with their private jet.

I'm no fan of Pim's but this is clearly something out of his control.

Agree with this 100%

Half an hour, not bad :P:lol:

...I'm a morning person!

Its 9.30 in the morning:shock:

To be competely honest, no football club has ever "produced" a player, their parents do the producing... matter of fact I wouldn't mind doing some producing right now.

Indeed. Produced could have possibly been interchanged with Developed.
Still, this saga is a good example of the issues with language in electronic forms.

So by produced you mean that an A-league club should be the "first" club they have played for? The A-league has been around for five years, most professional footballers start playing football at about the age of 6. Hence, by my math, for the A-league to officially "produce" a player by your stringent standards, we should have an 11 year old playing for the Socceroos. Since we don't, the A-league has failed.

Let me justify my interpretation of produced...

Who the fuck was Oar, Jedinak, Vidosic, Ruka etc before they played in the A-league?

Hmm well Fozz has gone on about that panel idea of his for ages and yeah, it's driven inpart by his hardly concealed PFA kind of agenda bias. Even though he wasn't great, it was still good when Branko Culina was an analyst with SBS' coverage, because he helped balance out the perspective with he being a coach. Foz has and will never likely be, an elite level coach. And not that, that is necessary when it comes to being a 'football analyst,' I can certainly appreciate the perspective of former elite coaches (Ange ASIDE), when the comes to football analysis.

Anyway, there certainly appear to be some chronic things wrong, but again, I also agree with those who say not to blow this too out of proportion. Germany and that 'red card' certainly exacerbated our weaknesses. We could all see why Verbeek chose to move onto Morocco, to run their 'youth set up' of all roles (rather than a senior role - Eric Gerets, a guy who would've made an ace Socceroos coach candidate, is their senior NT's coach). He even suggested the pressure was alot.

Interesting, I remember hearing and even noticing how Verbeek is certainly more a 'player's coach' if that makes sense. Certainly he's quite a departure from the Hiddink style, when it comes to managing the playing staff. Schwarzer has certainly flourished during the qualification period, perhaps thanks inpart due to the assurance over his place given by Verbeek (Unlike Hiddink who played he and Kalac off against each other and that infamous switch for the Croatia game). Interesting though, in recent times how Schwarzer suggested Hiddink was some what conciliatory with him, when they met in the EPL, though it's easy too after the fact (One wonders if Hiddink would do any different in hindsight, and perhaps with Kalac's mistake, yeah, though that aside, unlikely). Verbeek's approach in this area has also seen us sway some youngsters back into our NT fold, guys like Rhys Williams, Dario Vidosic and Shane Lowry. His approach also tolerated Viduka's long stalling over his NT future, where surely a Hiddink more disciplinarian like character would've forced Dukes' hand alot sooner.

Qualification was one thing, but this WC camp/lead up has been somewhat of a contrast - Prep under Hiddink was like a fortress and things were tight and quiet. It was like 'Bootcamp Hiddink.' And player comments to the media were all quite restricted/limited at their isolated location. But under Verbeek we've had problems with our training base and have very publically seen our side's change in tactical approach against the Dutch and US, which has been somewhat concerning, especially when the US punished us for it. Now granted South Africa is NO Germany when it comes to facilities, so we can't help that soo much, but the players have been making comments and Pim has, and not to mention all our comments about 'the ball,' especially from Schwarzer and co, POST that US loss. One reflects if such excuse making etc... blame on the ball, would've been allowed during Camp Hiddink? That's kind of hindsight of me though, as I was taking that all for granted and just hoping for the best, come Germany, even despite the concerning performances against NZ and the US especially.

I suppose as Pim himself has kind of suggested, we still have two games to pull that rabbit from the hat - we certainly need to, to get the six points. But I must get this out of the way now - Harry this, Harry that! Harry alone will not save us - but having him in there will certainly help! Throw Kennedy in there too and sort out that left side (Don't have Culina on the left flank!).



In regards to the off topic discussion over developing talent - There's nothing wrong with the State League clubs producing talent who then go onto the A-League - Infact it's natural and to be encouraged, it's part of the player development pathway and it's the very point of the A-League. What should the players just stay in the State League, should they leave straight from State League to Europe (Like some do)?

The only matter of dispute in that regard in the level of compensation and yes, that flat $3k compensation fee probably needs adjustment for purposes of fairer compensation.

Edited by GloryPerth: 16/6/2010 12:45:21 AM

Footage of them training on tv was probably a file tape. After that performance I'd be training the lads behind closed doors.

Foster has always picked the worst times to attack people. And although it was certainly heartfelt it was rather unwise IMO.

According to an interview today, the team jet had problems and didn't arrive at camp till 9am the following day. Bit hard to train when awake all night. Not that they would have as for obvious reasons it's normal practice to have a light recovery day following a game.

Edited by skeptic: 16/6/2010 12:03:41 AM

I read somewhere they were back at training within 12 hours of the game..and there was footage of them training on TV.

Foz suggestions are those of a peanut...and 4 days before a must win game at the absolute highest level.

Edited by AndyRoo: 16-6-2010 12:00:36 오전

Les - "Pim needs to forget about the Science Fiction."

The players were given the day after the German game off? What the?

http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/video/267372/Socceroos-panel-chat-pt-2

http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/video/267367/Socceroos-panel-chat-pt-1/

By the same token, in qualifying we won but it was HOW we won, winning poorly, that was the problem.