Our A-League Stars are Leaving us
Imagine being a Carlton fan in the AFL. You’re mid way through the season; you are primed to make a run into the upper reaches of the table and are a serious contender to bring silverware back to your home ground. Then, one day, just as you are filled with optimism whilst gearing up for another huge game, Marc Murphy leaves the club. Now imagine the club receives little to no compensation for his departure.
Imagine being a Melbourne Storm fan, desperate to make a mark in the sporting landscape of Melbourne. You sit a top the table and are overwhelming favourites to win the Premiership. Then one day Billy Slater just packs up his life and moves overseas, leaving the club with no time to replace a player of that quality.
Sounds absolutely ridiculous right? Not if you're an A-League supporter.
To supporters of the highest level of the round ball code in Australia, this scenario is all too common and a situation that has a sense of inevitability about it before every season starts.
This is the nature of the beast and what makes football in Australia so unique and why the roster and list management of the squad's can often be very difficult and complex.
Imagine hoping a player absolutely dominates a game
for your club, but hopefully not enough to get picked up on the radar of an international club, it makes for stressful viewing!
Over the 2013/2014 A-League season so far, 9 key players from 5 different teams have made the decision to up and leave to chase lucrative offers to play football overseas. So what are the reasons that make this such a complex issue to comprehend?
Firstly, as a fan of your club, it's the reason you fork out the money for a reserved seat and a
membership. It's the reason you
go to the club store and spend far too much on a replica shirt
and it's the reason you take the bus to Adelaide on a Friday morning when the boys play away. That’s because you love your club, and you want to see them win.
Seeing your club be successful is the ultimate for a fan and at times we can be very unreasonable about accepting anything less. This is why key players leaving mid-season can be a drain on supporters and they understandably find it hard to keep the faith.
If you are committed long term to the club via fan support, then why can't they commit by staying? Can't the club just say 'no'?
This is definitely a valid point and it's hard to find a professional sport around the world who would tell you that fan's aren't their primary stake-holder. However taking that view is being ignorant towards our game, our league and the fight our players go through to forge a meaningful career.
To better understand why the A-League should be viewed as a stepping stone, not an end-game, let's look some examples.
Before the start of this season, key midfielder Billy Celeski from the Melbourne Victory decided to leave the team which was on the brink of contending for a title and to leave the league which had named him an 'A-League All Star' (yes, it was actually a thing). Instead deciding on a move to the more or less irrelevant United Arab Emirate's Pro-League with Al-Shaab CSC.
Whilst seeing a Melbourne boy who'd represented the club 91 times including winning a Championship jet off and uproot his family to the UAE, in what is considered a 'sideways step' sounds absolutely ridiculous to an outsider. Unfortunately for the fan's it just made all too much sense for him to turn down the move.
You see, Billy is 28 years old. Whilst being reinvigorated under Ange Postecoglou to play the best football of his career, he has never hit any meaningful heights with stints at Perth Glory and Bulleen Zebra's before Melbourne. He was offered a lucrative offer to play his football in the UAE, one that would see him net $400,000AUD, equating to 3 times as much as he stood to earn at the Victory.
It's a stretch to think the football in UAE would be any real improvement and it is hard to imagine the living conditions being ideal to those of Melbourne. For a player on the cusp of his 30's, who are we as fans and the club who employed him to deny him one final pay day? Central Coast Mariners goalkeeper Mathew Ryan is a different case all together. The up and coming superstar between the sticks, who will most likely be Australia's first choice keeper come the Brazilian World Cup later this year. He’s courtship and eventual move to Belgian giants Club Brugge could very well have been something of a downer to a footballing region needing a superstar to market their game with.
Mariner’s fans did not see it that way. As a NSW product and a mainstay in goal at Central Coast during a highly successful period, they had seen Mat Ryan jet off to Europe with great pride and with the hopes he would acquit himself highly and take his career to the next level. You see in these situations, when a young star is involved, the game and the progression of our players must take precedence over our local teams. In what was a nice touch for the club, Club Brugge still paid Central Coast a transfer fee despite Ryan's contract being due for expiration just a day later.
The same can be said about Socceroo Dario Vidosic. The 26 year old who returned back to Australia from German Bundesliga club FC Nurnberg to play for Adelaide United. He quickly became the focal point of the Red's attack, scoring 15 goals on his way to becoming a club hero and arguably the best player in the competition.
With results like that, it was only a matter of time before overseas came calling again for the man raised in Queensland. This time it was in the form of FC Sion from the Swiss Super League.
Whilst receiving a transfer bid for your star player would draw intense consideration and in many cases a quick rejection for any major teams in the big leagues around the world, in Australia it's a different ball game. Adelaide knew they were a better team with Dario in it, but they are also well aware he is a man with aspiration's, with dream's and with a real shot to make it big overseas. So they terminated his contract without any hesitation, received a transfer fee for their troubles and wished their best player good luck as he left for a new chapter in his career.
It isn't just restricted to players either. When the Central Coast Mariner's Championship winning coach Graham Arnold was courted and approached by Japanese J-League team Vegalta Sendai. It triggered the 'overseas release' clause that the club had agreed to place in Arnold's contract allowing him to finish at Central Coast Mariners and assume his lucrative post in Japan.
For followers of other major codes in Australia, it would be just impossible to comprehend your coach leaving after 4 weeks of the season to pursue better opportunities or without being sacked.
It was something Central Coast were well aware of, “The success of our club over the past three seasons under Graham Arnold and his staff always meant Graham would receive interest from rival A-League and foreign clubs," General Manager Peter Turnbull said. "As such, we have been planning for the past 18 months for Phil (Moss) to take on the role of head coach ... Graham has been helping prepare Phil for the position.”
Now what other sport do you have to plan for that during a season?
The common theme among all of these stories is that while yes, we want the best player's playing in our league and increasing the quality of football played every year, we have to be realistic about where our league sit's in the footballing landscape. We realize, for us to have a better National Team and take steps forward as a footballing nation, club’s need to be selfless when a player (or manager) gets an opportunity overseas and to do what is best for his development. So far, the club's have been excellent in doing so.
So next time you see Robbie Kruse scoring goals for the Socceroo's, Mile Jedinak captaining Crystal Palace in the Premier League or Curtis Good playing in a League Cup Final at Wembley, remember that these players started here in our back yard. Without the 'developing then selling' aspect of our league, none of this would be possible.
Don't take it personally if they leave your club and understand the situation we are in. Enjoy them while it lasts, be proud of their career progression and sit back and watch the next one come through.