Has the disbandment of the AIS lead to a loss of a generation of footballers? Former Socceroos have lauded the AIS for their development, but it now doesn't exist and Mark Viduka has called for some changes to the current youth structure.
Some of the greatest footballers Australia has produced sit down to discuss what they feel needs to be done for our country to produce a higher standard of player, on Optus Sport's State of Football chat.
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As a local club player and father, it's become a rich mans sport. The academies in Sydney are marketing machines, making you feel like your child is the next superstar, but only making money off parents and not really developing the players. The coaches do the drills, but they don't break down the process and properly teach the kids. It's more like child-minding - if the kids get it, they get it, if they don't then they don't. Agree with Viduka we need the pyramid structure - strong players need to play with stronger players, and there's no gain for the team that wins 20-0, nor the team that loses. Similarly, good players get lumped with weak players, and as a result, they play in an average division playing average games. Also agree we need ex players to become coaches. A-League teams also need relegation, so that NPL teams get the hope of promotion.
The Dukes. Listen, FFA!
Because it’s not the National sport. I live in Mildura, Victoria and here we have lost so many good talents to AFL for one reason, it pays. I’m only 28 and the amount of skill I’ve seen wasted by code trading is crazy, and every time I can get them alone and ask them why they stopped playing soccer they said it was because they were offered money to play Australian Rules Football and in soccer they had to pay to play. Also the lack of talent scouts, I’ve never seen one here ever, so they imagine they won’t get anywhere except Sunday league football. This is a big problem in my opinion.
Hey Lou, I used to play in Mildura for Nichols point back in the early-mid 90’s great Comp And totally agree But being soccer being a very lowly 3rd behind cricket and afl in a regional area. There was a time to shine, when you made the Sunraysia team and played other regional areas like Bendigo etc. we had some really go players got offered to go further but it’s so far from Melbourne. Do they still do that? Spot on the best athletes don’t play the right kind of football in AU
miller chassis Hey Miller, yeah they still do that but less and less people a chosen to compete in state matches. Remember Cosmos FC? They went defunct because of lack of players. Mildura United we’re scraping by with minimum players every week because they couldn’t secure funding for their indigenous players. Eventually there won’t be a league here I believe. We’ve erected giant pitch lights and we can’t even use them because we have to been told by the council that it runs too much electricity for them to want to pay, so we can’t have any night games. It’s just depressing we can’t have any actual proper league here, and it not just here. It’s all over regional Australia.
mmm that's a shame I guess when its so far from a major city makes it hard. also its common in most regional areas that the kids move away to the city when they leave home. but even back when I played under 14s I would fill in when the senior team was short which was common place, that's a shame about cosmosanadulu (did I get it right?) not many Turkish kids there anymore? the teams when I played had strong ethnic influence. three colours -Italian mostly southern Italian mildura united -greek cosmos -Turkish mildura city -Italian, northen Italian is home ground still out merbine way? Zagreb -Croatian ground was at irymple nicols point -English/Australian (formally Aztec rovers ) a few south American roots I guess you feel the same as heaps of football/soccer fans as why its the most played sport but still a dirty word.
The majority of Australia's talented players come out of nsw and northern nsw. Victoria has always lagged behind.
Also, cut away the extreme amount of nepotism at all levels of the game. The truth is, australia has always had another golden generation lying in wait. BUT, disgusting nepotism at all levels has stopped australia from developing that final product. Agent, clubs, officials, FFA and more are all to blame for this.
Few grand just for a season at some rep clubs. Few hundred for non rep teams. Mental.
What we need is a mix of NSL with the aleague Have the passion, development and community from the NSL plus the administration from the new aleague
the FFA should do stuff like getting rid of the salary cap and promotion relegation and add some extra teams so we can have a derby in places like Perth and Adelaide and Queensland and also having a team in new places like Canberra Darwin, Tasmania and also if we had clubs there then that’s places with no sports like rugby which would make soccer the main topic there. It is also quite silly only having one Queensland team
He was amazing at Leeds. Remember him well, a great talent and a top person
My thoughts. We must do some marketing of the league domestically and internationally. Let’s just scrap the salary cap. Sign up some high quality players freely. Put the A-League on more Asian countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam a good method is to sign their star players. This will bring some sponsorships from these countries. I would even try to invite 1-2 teams from ASEAN countries to the A-League Once the A-League stars to bring high viewerships numbers. Investments will increase. Increase the number of teams 14-18. Give Perth, Adelaide, Queensland and New Zealand a second team, Darwin Canberra and Tasmania should be given teams. Although in this scenario we would not have relegation due to smaller clubs not being able to sign high quality players if there’s a lack of investment. After this we can reach our local talents that want to get paid and we will not lose them to AFL or such. Although I prefer players that give their heart to soccer rather than do it for cash.
No relegation, no competition, no momentum to play in higher level. Far behind Japan and Korean now.
Yes canberra teampls
Grandpa Phil You’re very right
When I was a young player the AIS was for me and a lot of my teammates, the place we wanted to be. It was the dream. When you heard that such and such player got selected for the AIS, you were jealous. There was an air that only the elite got to the AIS. Can not believe they got rid of it.
This is the most informative video I've seen in Australian football. However, I have quite a number of comments to make. In Australia in 2008, I undertook a Dutch KNVB Advanced Coaching Youth Certificate, ostensibly having C and B Licence content at the time. The previous week all the A League youth coaches took it - Popa, Veart, Muscat, Tobin, Vidmar, Corica, etc. A few years later, I think 2013, I undertook the FFA C Licence. The C Licence was supposedly an amalgam of Dutch, French, German and Spanish methodology and curricula. There are similarities and differences between the 2008 Dutch KNVB and the 2013 FFA methodology, but they were essentially similar in content. Moreover, the 4-3-3 defensive midfield formation,has been advocated as an underage development formation only by Football Fed Aus. Not prescribed as a preferred, mandated formation at senior level. The 4-3-3 defensive midfield triangle, with slight adjustments, is evolved seamlessly into the 4-3-3 attacking midfield triangle, the 3-4-3 diamond shaped midfield , the 3-4-3 flat midfield, the 4-2-3-1, the 4-5-1 with the 1:4 midfield shape, and the 4-2-2-2 false 9. It is argued with the inherent diamonds and triangles in this basic 4-3-3 defensive midfield triangle, and all the aforementioned slight variations, that it is dead easy to play a 4-4-2 flat midfield. This 4-4-2 is often deployed in the Ball Possession Opposition phase of play, in combination with the 4-3-3 permutations in the Ball Possession phase of play. Also, I'm not sure if the Marks, John, Josip, Craig and Vince realise this, but the English FA were going to visit Australia to see how the Socceroos from 2014 onwards, have been able to play as cohesively as a team, given supposed modest individuals who comprise those teams. The English FA have been impressed with the Australian team unit. They also thought that the Aussie development system, was better than the English system, in that underage national team players had grown up knowing the roles required in the individual positions well, in a development system that used the 4-3-3 formation as a base for underage players. Generally Belgian, Dutch, Spanish and Danish teams, and recently the French adhere to a 4-3-3, or the Germans use 4-2-3-1, when the national senior teams play at some phase in their formations in their prescribed game plan. It is no coincidence they have had massive success. Moreover, most of these nations use the 4-3-3 in their underage development systems too.
Great show. These guys are our best Listen
It is so important that our best continue to speak. Please listen to Dukes FFA. AIS was a great vehicle to develop young talent in this country. Let's get this going again. The A-league club academys can be expensive. Give an option to put these kids in an environment with the best brains and develop....away from the financial woes of the clubs.
Excellent discussion lads and being around the same gen as you all, I can totally relate. The was a huge difference with the game back then compared to today.
Love to see this conversation happen again now 2 years later .. Not much has changed ..
Great video. Loved watching these legends play perhaps next time you could bring in that new guy that’s head of the FFA Then you could get answers straight away.
Some good points here. Worth a listen.
Thanks lads!!! You all wore the Socceroos jersey with heart and endeavour!!! These boys need to be put in admin and coaching roles. We need all of this combined European culture again to make us strong.
Australian Football is crap for many reasons but one is We as a society accept mediocrity. There is no ladder, no keeping score. no best & fairest. All these little things created passion and drive. Incentives drive behaviour and if we want to develop world class footballers we need instill competivness at an early age.
Yet Australia is the only team where football is not a major sport, given the paucity of football media coverage, who has qualified five times in succession for the last five World Cups. The Socceroos can't be that 'crap' if only 9 other football nations, out of 208 FIFA football playing nations, have qualified for five successive World Cups, besides Australia.
What a great player mark was
Culture plays a huge part, if it didn't then America would be producing champion players. They have the money and resources to do so. and yet they aren't able to. But a small country like Australia in the 90's was able to produce amazing player, the difference for me was culture.
I have boys playing NPL in Melbourne. Very expensive, sub standard training grounds, some clubs charge big $ and have parens filling in! There are talented youngsters and numerous tournaments, but scouting is non existent. Some very average individuals are recruited by A League clubs cause their father's are coaches or sponsors.....
Are they actually saying that every academy in Australia is forced to teach just the 433?!? And in general coaching? I hope I misunderstood 😮. If so, why?!?
Get schools to do more about it
Another comment I'll make is that most of our esteemed sextet of former Socceroos have not pursued the Football Australia coach education in Australia - apart from Craig in 2010. I thought both John and Josip had undergone most of their training in England for C ,B and A licences, and Dukes has definitely done his coaching badges in England. It seems as though Josip and John have done some sort of Football Aus coach education. It is axiomatic the English coach education is vastly inferior to the more cerebral Australian coach education, with its content being based on an amalgam of the traditional, proactive style European powerhouses - Spain, France Holland and Germany's methodology. Notwithstanding , I take the points we probably still need the AIS/NTC program, based on Duke's recounted experiences moving from the NSL to full time AIS/NTC training. Also, the cost of playing football at junior level is exorbitant. The cost of elite programs is shocking in Australia, whilst other sports are free. John's comments carry massive weight, because he is speaking from the perspective of a successful A League coach. He has had massive involvement in Australian football since he has retired as a player. In addition, I thought Craig was coaching the Roar underage program - and - I thought he has been recognised as having quite a degree of success developing players. So his comments carry a lot of weight too. The final question I will pose is, would all the Euroroos of the 90s and early 2000s have been able to access European football, if they had to compete with all the African players and to a lesser extent, East Asian players, that scouts chase now?
Football ⚽️ is the best sport in the World 🌎 It needs more funding from the State and Federal governments in Australia 🇦🇺 It is the World Game (over 200 nations).
It doesn't help at all that we keep getting so many hits and misses in Europe and Asia. Back in Viduka's prime, most of our players were thriving in Europe and Asia. Some of them were even the best on their teams at their teams at the time like Cahill at Everton and Viduka at Middlesborough. Its critical to thrive in either one of them. Preferably Europe because the quality of football, opposition and the general technical aspect of the game is at its best.
The only problem was that apart from 2006, the Golden Generation were involved in about half of our 32 years of failure to qualify for World Cups. The current 2022 Socceroos have just defeated 5th ranked South Americans Peru, whereas the 2001 and 1993 Socceroos lost to the 5th ranked CONMEBOL teams in sudden death play offs. Also, losses to Iran (twice), New Zealand, Israel and Scotland in that 32 years, aren't that good either. The current Socceroos ( 2005 -2022) have qualified for World Cups five times in succession - twice beating powerhouse South American teams in play offs, and a North American, CONCACAF team, Honduras, in a play off as well.
Dear Viduka..I used to see you at Leeds and Kewell so much! Australia looks good and has to look great but if you live in Australia you well know something is wrong big time in here. It just looks better from outside and for many things is, but the system is unbelievable in alsmost every department. This is just a consequence of it. After this pandemic you will see how many job position, that exist only in Australia, will also no exist anymore.
Aaaaand... Cos we keep accidentally falling into a qualification spot.. nothing has changed or looks to change anytime soon.
Scouting talents is absent here, not all kids will have the chance to evolve in well set-up teams. Also A-league is there but there is no relegation system too
The main reason why im not a coach , why would I want to coach when I can't give my interpretation of the game,or play to my players strengths
Dukes to head ffa plz
Maybe start cutting away the rot with dirty agents. You have agents paying fox sports, sbs etc to promote players but you also have agents paying them big time to trash talk and devalue others too.
Big bad Dukes ❤️
While the boys here make very interesting points they choose to avoid a glaring point. I feel the boys avoid this because they still have involvement in the game at the highest levels and are still answerable to the FFA Coaching and TV hierarchy. Therefore are to scared to discuss it. This is discussed behind closed doors all over the country. The ruling "elite" have stifled grassroots true development for the last 60 years. My involvement in the NSL as a GK and now as a high level referee has reinforced this belief. GK's now refused to kick long and when questioned say, "im not allowed too". I can go on but too many people will get upset............
There is no player development in Australian soccer. It is all about the money. Take the money from the youth to pay the seniors in the NPL. Very lazy funding of senior players. Coaching at NPL level is woeful. Compare Australia with all the money and resources it has to develop players against a country like Uruguay with 3.4 million people, playing on dirt fields and poor. How does a country that small produce, Forlan, Suarez, Cavani, Darwin Nunez, Bentancur and Valverde? The FA should go to Uruguay and learn the secret of developing kids into the best footballers in the world. You will see it is not about money for the clubs. It is about developing kids to be world class footballers so that the country can brag and be proud of them.
There aren’t enough pathways to the top because there’s no money in the game.
We need players like Foz, guys who can progress and one day grow into sbs commentators, white sneakers, plentiful digital chalkboard moments and anecdotal comparisons to games against Fiji in the late 80s
employ dukes as head of national player development
Need more professional training... time~