I didn't comment on that, only commented on the brushing aside of the Asian cup win as any sort of achievement. Your point about the qualifying campaign only increases the AC achievement, really.
But Australia were, and are, only a striker away from being a good team. If we were an A-League club we would just buy a foreigner.

Can't stand the bloke but he at least tried a shitload of new players.

If we remember back 4 years ago, Holger's biggest problem was he kept selecting the same players that were well and truly past it.

I'm glad to see the back of Ange but at least he did phase in a few players

And then couldn't get 1 of 4 Auto spots ?

Or is the team worse now ?

He had 400,000 points.

He is a liar. That is a fact. He always talked about how everything he did was for the benefit of football in australia, for the socceroos etc. and how it was all about what you did in the world cup when you got there, not just getting there. 

now he's left the team completely worse off. he's f--ked us. how can the next coach lead us to the world cup, start from scratch, with only a few games left. he had OVER 4 YEARS to prepare or resign and left it til now. 

none of makes any sense. i think the pressure completely cracked him to be honest. at some point his whole persona changed. 

I was confident of semi finals but didn't think we had the team to go further. Firmly believe that Ange was the difference between 3rd place playoff and winning.

I expected us to win. 

Actually did expect less. And therefore rate the win as that much better.

Yeah it was good and we made it......just. 

Woud you expect anything less as a host of the tournament, under any manager? Especially given our home record. 

Then there is a whole other debate about the quality of Asian teams at the time, Japan etc , and we were lucky we missed Iran. 

Asian champions not good enough? Only decent trophy we have ever won.

3 times he has done this? He owed Brisbane absolutely nothing, they showed faith in him when he was blacklisted from the game and he repaid them in full with multiple titles. Every job he has taken he has left it in a better position then when he took over.

The fact that he didn't talk to the players or staff before the decision. Just means he has run out of ideas and they are not good enough. Everything in his statement was about himself. 

He thinks that being the NT coach is stressful. He is in for shock for a European club hell there is a rumour on going to China. He's not going to last long there.

3 times he has done this. So it is a trend. Basically he followed the path I thought he would when he took over. 

Exactly. We are in a far better position now than in 2014, even without Ange. 

Any coach worth his money should be able to take this team and at least keep them where they are, if not improve them. They know all the formations and each other so its just a matter of the new guy working with whats been done and not dismantling it entirely to start again. Whether that's a back 3 or 4, diamond or box midfield or whatever it should be quite doable.

We aren't at the same point we were 4 years ago, 4 years ago the captain needed to be retired and a host of older players phased out, the team you saw the past few weeks is the one that's going to Russia.

Exactly!! 

Agreed... The reason we dumped Holger four years ago was because we knew the team was going nowhere. We brought in new players for the 2014 world cup, and we almost sacrificed our chances in that tournament. In my mind we did that because we were thinking about 2018. Now we've made it to 2018, but we're basically at the same point we were 4 years ago.

This is why I'm hoping Milicic gets the gig. At least he might be able to continue on the same sort of philosophy and we keep improving...

Not agreeing with what Ange did, but didn't Hiddink have 2 games before the Uruguay games?

It can be done

And yet the two biggest issues raised on here were the travel required for the Socceroos and uncovering the next generation of stars who largely play on the other side of the world, neither of which made it to your list.

Perhaps being a domestic coach in a foreign league may allow him to have more time close to his family.

That's a good question - have you asked him?

Well, what is he doing in between spasmodic friendlies?

Much simpler than entering a new club job in a foreign country. He'd be spending most of these months just watching matches, not the most stressful part of the job which is why most international managers are literally all at the end of their careers because it is less intensive than training every day, scouting the opposition, watching their matches and needing to deal with player problems on a daily basis.

Love how easy you make the job sound.

Like he's sitting in FFA HQ answering phone calls 9-5 on his days off

I wonder who the normalisation committee will appoint as our new coach 😁

We will see what he does next. Can't see how any club job will be less stressful than playing 3 or 4 practice matches in the next 7 months, then playing 3 competitive matches in two weeks.

I think number 3.
I can't help but think he isn't well (whether physically or mentally) and he realised it wouldn't be worth it in the end as this team was not going to do anything he would go down in folklore for.

My money's on that.

Dude had his second kid before taking over, and I think has had a third very recently.  Who knows how long he has to spend away from them, but some things are more important than your job.

Got to be more to this....what coach in the world anywhere gets a team to qualify for the biggest tournament on earth and then walks away without going to the big show ? It would be a huge tick on his resume if he coached there and did relatively well.

Conspiracy theory 1... Ange ran out of ideas as to how to take the team to the next level so got out before he could be found out....( sounds familiar ...Roar anyone ?) .
Conspiracy theory 2... Ange is having some sort of serious personal issues...(depression, family problems etc )
Conspiracy theory 3... all of the above

I guess the truth may come out in his next book...although the real truth is more likely in the next book .....about him by someone else !
We all know what Ange thinks of Ange .I would like to hear a few "insiders" perspectives

Will he take his kids out of school and move them to China, Scotland or Greece to lessen their burden?

From the press conference I interpreted that he was resigning due to the personal cost of being the socceroos coach. Think about the toll on his family from all the travel around the world watching players. This toll was only going to get worse in the lead up to the world cup and he decided it wasn't worth it. As a club coach he will not need to do this.

He probably had to resign now,as once FIFA take over,it looks like a protest against them.
Alternatively if he resigned then ,he wouldnt have the pleasure of having Gallop (his pal DG)sit next to him.
I wonder if he had his resignation speech approved by FFA?
Actually based on how he left Brisbane ,it is quite possible he left because he couldn't see how to make the Soccerroos improve.At Brisbane he took the players as far as their ability could and he was humbled in the ACL.He couldn't sack half the players and start again,so he left for Victory.