Del Piero to Nani: A-League Men‘s returns with a flicker of former glory

The Italian legend’s arrival pushed the narrative that the A-League was growing into a force in Australian sport.

It was. Big names and big noise from packed crowds served as proof.

And now, it is not.

If success has a thousand fathers, the paternity suit on why the A-League failed to kick on wouldn’t know who to DNA test first, given the many candidates who contributed to countless failings.

The A-League Mens is an easy target. A punchline of sorts. Best days are far gone, hurtling more and more toward irrelevance. Just 7,500 rolling up for the season opener, a grand final rematch between Melbourne City and Western United on Friday didn’t do much to dispel such theories.

And then Saturday night happened. A sodden Allianz Stadium came alive to remind us of a different truth.

Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory played out a classic amid another Harbour City deluge and while one game can’t wash away all misgivings, the noise bouncing around Sydney’s impressive new stadium mixed with an open, exciting contest served as a sense-rattling reminder all is not lost.

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Melbourne Victory won the game 3-2, and celebrated as if a trophy was attached to the achievement in front of a strong band of away support.

Caught up in the fervour was the A-League’s big marquee signing, Nani.

The Portuguese winger, winner of four Premier Leagues with Manchester United, played his part on Saturday night. He set up a goal. Played fluently. Will get better, and importantly, as witnessed by dancing in his underpants around a jubilant dressing room, looks totally invested physically and emotionally.

The APL, the collaboration of clubs that now has control over the A-Leagues after a messy parting with Football Australia, knew this season was ultra-important. Clear of Covid, now was time to spend some of the $140 million in private equity investment on big names.

Nani is the only one to make it.

Other deals like trying to attract Arsenal, Chelsea and Barcelona legend Cesc Fabregas to upstarts Macarthur fell over. He went to Como in Italy instead. Lake Como over Campbelltown. He doesn’t know what he’s missing.

Seriously, though, Fabregas AND Nani would have given more of what Del Piero provided a decade ago – cut through. Not just in the football community, but anyone with a general passing interest in sport looking for something to latch onto once the footy codes ended and before stumps were stuck in a wicket.

Great games like Saturday help. Great games with great names really change perception.

Nani won’t lift all metrics, though he will help Victory’s. Other clubs will have to find other ways.

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Ambition is key. Brisbane Roar ignored it and now look.

In 2012, Ange Postecoglou left Brisbane off the back of two-straight championships. The framework was there to build the club into a sporting powerhouse.

A decade on, the club has no training ground, and have moved home games in the past few seasons to Redcliffe on the northern tip of a city of 2.5 million they have to themselves.

Suncorp was deemed too big and too expensive to hire, but on Saturday, Roar tiptoed back to their spiritual home where in 2012 they won a second-straight grand final in front of 50,000.

As the new side led by charismatic English striker Charlie Austin drew with Macarthur 0-0, one side of the ground was shut off to fans to save a bit of coin. Roar management knows there is a lot to fix. Suncorp being totally open by season’s end is Brisbane’s main KPI.

Decade-old reference points are relevant in the west of Sydney, too.

The Del Piero days coincided with the establishment of Western Sydney Wanderers. From nothing, a no-name squad meshed with the class of Japanese veteran Shinji Ono won early and kept winning. A cult following grew. The noise of the main fan group the RBB was deafening, impossible to ignore. The aura gradually slipped away. Bad management decisions, bad recruiting, bad relations with a demanding fanbase.

Sunday’s game at CommBank Stadium against Perth was the start of the latest attempt at rejuvenation. The game wasn’t pretty. Wanderers won 1-0. But the noise returned from the RBB, everyone singing from the same hymn sheet.

It’s pretty simple in the west of Sydney. Winning is the only way the chorus continues.

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The great shame of the weekend was the postponement of Central Coast and Newcastle after La Nina, lingering on Australia’s east coast like a hangover from a weekend in Tijuana, turned Central Coast Stadium into a swimming pool.

Despite it being just one postponement, after the 100 of last season due to Covid and weather, it felt deflating, not least for ruining a proper farewell for Matt Simon, the bollocking striker forced into retirement by a ruptured disc that decided to float in his upper spine.

More annoyingly, it robbed all of a fleeting look at 18-year-old sensation Garang Kuol, who in January will join Newcastle United in England (though will likely be loaned to a club in Europe due to work permit issues).

Stories like Kuol’s will help the A-Leagues sing, though raising prospects through the A-League system has long been a challenge.

Young players find it overly hard to break in. Foreign quotes allow five overseas players per squad, though the reliance on those players has waned since Covid. Only Western Sydney started all five foreigners on opening weekend. Melbourne City, home to much of the elite young talent in Victoria, started just two.

All up 104 of the 148 players on opening weekend are eligible for the Socceroos. It’s a solid number, though frustration remains for many about the recycling of players through the league. Seventy-five per cent of the Australian players involved on the weekend have played at more than one A-League club.

Pushing youngsters past foreign and established players is also complicated by national youth representation.

With his time running out at the Mariners, Garang Kuol won’t be available for the next fortnight after a call up for the Young Socceroos (under 20s) for Asian Cup qualifiers in Kuwait next week. The tournament is important. If Australia progresses, it keeps alive chances of competing at the under 20 World Cup.

The under 17s achieved it in Shepparton on the weekend, qualifying for next year’s Asian Cup, which also doubles as qualifiers for the 2023 under 17 World Cup.

Qualification for these tournaments is hugely important.

As sure as night follows day, and Elon Musk finds a way to stay in the news, Australia’s football reputation is boosted by performing at international youth tournaments. Players are sold from them. Clubs make money. Everyone looks good.

But it’s a long game. And with perception a matter for the here and now, losing an attraction like Kuol has rankled the Mariners.

Finding balance in nurturing talent will always be an imperfect proposition, but it’s one the A-Leagues need to be bullish about. Without huge commercial backing and a TV deal which is dwarfed by the other sporting codes, opening the pipeline to the overseas transfer market is a ready-made answer.

Many young players play roles off the bench, and there is no concurrent youth competition to keep those players as sharp as they need to be should an opportunity arise.

To use three examples from the weekend, exciting talents Adrian Segecic (Sydney FC), Nishan Velupillay (Victory) and Musa Toure (Adelaide), got game time off the bench. Yet if that continues, the total game time for the month might not reach 90 minutes.

England’s Premier League-era problems of producing homegrown talent have gone away, not least for the instruction of a proper structure below the top level, where under 21 players are involved in up to 50 games a season.

Here in Australia, so frustrated with the lack of direction from an administrative level there is talk of some clubs just organising their own mini ‘Cup’ competition to top-up those players’ game time, to ensure readiness if and when required.

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For now, six games a weekend remain the focal point for the domestic development of Australian men’s football at the elite level, development which over the last decade has become increasingly arrested.

There is no quick fix.

From Del Piero to Nani, the past decade contained more glumness than glee when it came to pushing the domestic game forward.

Close attention to every detail is required, without worry of perception from those who may have been interested in the A-Leagues.

Late in Sunday’s Western Sydney win, Wanderers fans started singing about their next opponent, Melbourne Victory, in not-so-subtle terms.

At least they are looking forward to another game, instead of everything else that surrounds the game and the perception that goes with it.