Big Story
Your editor is behind today, as I spent last night meeting with Chicago Fire
owner and chairman Andrew Hauptman, discussing many of the issues I raised in my
open letter to Fire ownership last month.
Click to continue reading...
The dispute between several clubs in the USL's first division and the league's administrators
has reached the end-game this week, and Triangle Offense is reporting that the breakaway Team
Owners Association is submitting its application for recognition as a league to the US Soccer
Federation.
Click to continue reading...
Its been just over a month since I last put fingers to keyboard and tapped out a paragraph or two
for this blog and a lot has happened in that time. Crowds continue to be a major talking point and
I was very pleased to see Gold Coast and Brisbane take steps to reduce their ticket prices and make
them more affordable for the general fan.
Click to continue reading...
Big Story
It's not often a 6-2 loss is taken to presage a "nation's arrival on the big stage", but that's the
reaction today in the Guardian from Anna Kessel on the England's women's team's
defeat in the UEFA European Championship final to Germany last night.
Click to continue reading...
The next time someone in Canberra tells you we've a huge junior base with 20,000 kids/registrations
tell them they are dreaming, same goes for 260,000 registrations across NSW or the paltry 50,000 in
Victoria.
What we have is a lot of people playing independently in their own clubs, maximum community in
Canberra is Woden Valley 1800.
Click to continue reading...
Football NSW Launches ‘Project 22'
Free to all selected players, this highly professional development setup allows players
to train up to five (5) times a week – for 40 weeks of the year – with highly experienced and
qualified instructors.
Now it's time for Canberra to follow, not neccessarily in the same form, but develop we must.
Click to continue reading...
I've never written to the Capital Football Board before, never felt the need or desire but the
current debacle over "our" High Performance programs and it's ability to provide opportunities for
a much broader and younger football base, boys/girls, is such a positive move that something must
be done. And now.
Click to continue reading...
While reading an excellent piece on Seattle commercial approach and the coming grassroots-created
energy of the Portland Timbers over at Pitch Invasion, I had a thought, one involving an MLS...
Click to continue reading...
Well this has really got the locals talking. And thank god for the Nearpost; always got a solution
and right now that's just what we need.
And in blogland solutions are easy.
Capital Football has put on hold, maybe even scrapped, their plans for a change from the less than
equitable and limited current Academy structure to the proposed and advertised FFA facilitated
Talent Id program.
Click to continue reading...
Sign-ups for Capital Football High Performance Talent Ientification Program in Canberra have been
taken down.
Which either means:
They are full...unlikely.
The Board has put a stop to it. Embarassing for them to be in direct opposition to
the FFA. Better have a good reason if this is the case, not to me, to the FFA.
Click to continue reading...
MLS Rumors 30 July @ 02:59 PM EST
Miami's FIU Stadium would be the likelyhome of any MLS team.
Thought it was all over for Miami when Barcelona withdrew their bid? Maybe, but maybe not....
Official press release:
Miami Supporters Starting MLS DriveSince FC Barcalona gave up on Miami soccer for Major League
Soccer the fans in the area have had little to get excited about when it comes to MLS talk.
Click to continue reading...
Imagine listening to all that twaddle down the years about Small-Sided Games.
It develops your skill, it's great for technique, we must change blah blah blah.
I played small-sided games all my life, on the street with drains for goals. North of England, you
know, life was tough we got up before we went to bed!
Click to continue reading...
The FA has created a season-long campaign to celebrate and promote men's grassroots 11-a-side
football in England. The number of players and teams in 11v11 football leagues is in decline - and
the 18-22 year old group are the most likely to drop out of 11-a-side football... (I guess video
games, chasing women, and entering university will do that to you).
Click to continue reading...
"The number of youngsters in this country playing football at grass roots level is
enormous and that's now providing more elite players at junior level and many of them come into the
system."
Ernie Merrick talking to FourFourTwo
And this A-League season Kofi Danning, Ben Kantarovski, Mitch Nichols, Luke Devere and many many
more young Aussie players are starting to change the Australian game.
Click to continue reading...
Junior Age Categories
• season commences: 16/17/18 october, 2009
• 11 ‘round' home & away competition
• 9 competition weeks
• 2 gala rounds – 1 country-based & 1 metro-based
o gala rounds will coincide with w-league fixtures
• season concludes: 11/12/13 december, 2009
A lot of micky mouse football goes on in Canberra for the 36 weeks of the year when the junior
season doesn't run.
Click to continue reading...
Now many people complain that grassroots football is too expensive. The FFA even say in their
talented player document recently released that we have a (moral) responsibility to reduce the
costs.
Clearly with targeted sponsorship and the Federations providing outstanding opportunities for
sponsors through our participation rates this can be done.
Click to continue reading...
When Mark Viduka, Jason Culina, Mile Sterjovski, Josip Skoko and many others took Australia to the
last World Cup their Croatian heritage did not go unnoticed. Indeed Croatia themselves had three of
our boys in their squad.
Many wondered if this was the end of the Aussie Croatian production line.
Click to continue reading...
FFA: Justify your changes to SSG's to our vast majority, our children.
How do your changes benefit our Aussie kids, apart from the 1% of telented players.
So when I played football, my first real game was when I was ten. Until then I played 1 v 1, 2 v 2,
3,v 3 and 8 v 8 whenever we could with whoever we could get.
Click to continue reading...
My local club here in Canberra is Majura Football Club. Yes we've changed our name.
and who better to write the newsletter and tell EVERYONE about our name change than me!
Followers of this blog will know I've been doing my voluntary bit for my local club and here's our
latest newsletter.
Click to continue reading...
The FFA Technical Report, on the FFA website this week, it's a great start, but it's already taking
us backwards..for the most important people...our children...particularly the 99% who will never
play for Australia.
In Canberra we've been playing small-sided games for a number of years. In particular Under 10's
play 7 v 7.
Click to continue reading...
Is it true that only a Canberra A-League team, a financially viable one, can deliver what the
Central Coast are planning and Canberra Youth and Football community so desperately needs.
An international standard training and education centre the whole region can be proud of.
Now if the Central Coast can plan this.
Click to continue reading...
Bernie Lustica enthralled us on the radio last night with his story of his son Stephen's journey to
his first professional contract with Gold Coast United.
Here's a snippet:
"So Stephen came home from pre-season training (around age 12) and said my coach says I have to do
3,000 juggles by the end of the season.
Click to continue reading...
The kindly personages over at EPL Talk have nominated us for a couple of their EPL Awards,
namely Best EPL Blog and Best EPL Blogger. It's a voice-of-the-people, audience-vote kind of thing,
so if eight or ten thousand of you feel like surging over to the EPL Talk website and going
grassroots on some polling widgets, I'd be grateful.
Click to continue reading...
Great story on the front of the Sydney Morning Herald re:the development of football in the
Indigenous Communities of the Northern Territory.
With Borrolloola, 1000km from Darwin, the boys are already competing Internationally in the Arafura
games this week, against East Timor, Macau and Aceh.
Click to continue reading...
FFA Tech Director Han Berger had a chat with me last night about the new technical development plan
put out or about to be by the FFA.
First thing that struck me is that elite sports for kids is so serious these days, and I guess
Aussie football juniors are about to get a rude awakening! Maybe it's already happening in other.
Click to continue reading...
I've taken on my local junior club's newsletter where my daughter plays.
Happy for any comments, positive, negative or thoughts on how a club newsletter club be improved,
what would you like to see at your club etc..
Open publication - Free publishing - More soccer
Click to continue reading...
In my view any Coach taking on a junior team is a hero.
That said who you get as a Coach impacts on your learning, development and enjoyment.
Imagine being coached Piano by someone who had never played or learnt a note! And imagine paying
for that!
Watching three teams warm up in the Under 9's this weekend was interesting.
Click to continue reading...
Bring it on!
The FFA has released it's National Curriculum. See media release below.
It talks skills, Aussie psyche and how all elite teams will follow the 4-3-3 model.
Can someone please tell Pim Verbeek!
But three things caught my eye...
1.
Click to continue reading...
How long before you hear one of these comments:
Loitering, yes we're talking about the lazy striker planted by the other coach.
Small Sided Games...whatderyermean it's good for em, just boot it will ya.
Hey Ref...where's your specks.
Hey Coach..what about my son..oh so I am the Coach now!
Click to continue reading...
Canberra Rad Trpkovski is taking a group of Woden Valley Under 15 Boys to play in Finland, England,
France and Holland in July. See earlier post for podcast of Rad and the trip. No easy task and hats
off again to Woden Valley.
But he also mentioned he's arranged for his daughter, who will travel with the group, to play a
game in the tournament with a Helsinki local Under 13 side.
Click to continue reading...
Canberra United players Ashleigh and Nicole Sykes maybe be barred from playing in their local
Dubbo/Bathurst Under 18 team in the Western District boys league...but the story has reached the
FFA....
And the FFA has it seems engaged their Legal Department quicksmart.
Some members of the local association were laughing almost mocking when I rang them recently.
Click to continue reading...
No, sadly not Canberra, not yet..but Burton Albion.
I was born in the Brewing Capital of the World, surrounded by Brian Clough League Champs Derby
County, European Cup winners Aston Villa, and Notts Forest, and the super Baggies of the
1980's.
Burton is just eight miles from Derby, 21 from Nottingham, 25 from Birmingham, 30 Stoke, 25
Leicester, 25 West Brom, 25 Wolves so plenty of local football around over the years.
Click to continue reading...
No win situation A minute's silence, please, for a dead profession; an imPOSSIBLE profession; a
DREADFUL profession. A minute's silence, my friends, for the only white people who can truly know
what it's like to be discriminated against based on the colour of their skin—or, in this
case, the colour of their jersey: REFEREES.
Click to continue reading...
