Archive for October, 2008
About 10 weeks ago I had a small accident at Oz Tag. I play for the social aspect.
My right ring finger was pulled very hard and i broke a small piece of bone out of the joint. My doctor asked if I wanted to see an orthopedic surgeon. I said no.
Silly Me
I went back to him last Thursday and he had me into a specialist on Monday. I was in surgery on Tuesday afternoon. I now have my hand in a half cast and will be in a sling for the next 2 weeks at least.
Right Handed
I am right handed and it is now useless to me. I am typing this left handed. I had to sign bank docs yesterday with a left handed scrawl. I can manage brushing teeth and shaving right handed. I am yet to wipe my bum, so that should be interesting.
Take your doctors advice and see the specialist. If I did, it would all be fixed by now.
Cheers
Tezza
October 30 2008 | General | 3 Comments »
Is Simulation Killing our Game??
John Kosminas outburst last weekend earn t him an official reprimand from the FFA but no fine. What he was all upset about was his Captain, Ian Fyfe being sent off with minutes to go for hitting the back of Adrian Trinidad’s Head. In actual fact it was a slight tap as he wanted to take a quick free kick. The theatrics from Trinidad were ridiculous. He went down clutching his head and had treatment.
This sort of thing happens in every competition all around the world probably every weekend. Predominantly in the South American leagues, where Trinidad is from.
What the FFA and ultimately FIFA have to do is come down hard on this. The referees are being made out to look like idiots whilst the perpetrators are getting away scott free. In the case of Fyfe he has a 2 match ban.
Mark Shield told Fox Sports News that he would support retrospective action from a video review and so would other referees in Australia. Mark Shield is someone we should listen to. He was Australia’s top ref until last weekend when he retired from the game at 30 something years of age.
In fact, myself and a couple of mates were speaking to Mark Shield last year the night after he refereed the Asian Cup final between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. He had plenty of antics to deal with but was never fooled on that night. We actually spoke about this very topic. What we did agree on was that if a player was treated and had to leave the field of play, he then had to stay off the park for a set period of time. We also agreed on the retrospective review and punishment of players proven to be simulating.
Trinidad was back on the park within seconds of leaving it. If he had to sit out for 3 minutes or more I am sure he would have thought twice about simulating a fall.
The FFA already have a review policy in place and it should include simulation. They have used it to pick up a “Hand Ball” of all things. This is the biggest blight on our game, world wide. And here in Australia our other “Football” cousins can’t wait for this sort of stuff to happen.
I train with a bunch of blokes every Wednesday and Friday, they are all Rugby League or AFL followers. When I scoffed at teh Rugby League World Cup I was told very frankly that the FIFA World Cup is the Academy Awards for Diving. With incidents like last Sunday, I don’t really have an answer.
I don’t think Simulation is killing our game, but I do think it harms it. It MUST be stopped and players found guilty must be punished.
What do you think? Leave a comment
Cheers
Tezza
October 23 2008 | A-League | 2 Comments »
What World Cup???
This weekend here in Australia is the Rugby League World Cup. Apart from a bit of advertising on Channel 9 here there is very little coverage of it.
It features a massive 10 teams in 3 pools. I think the organisers are so worried about the domination of the top 3 nations (Australia, New Zealand and England) that they have put them all in the same pool. I have no interest in working out how the next round goes.
Is this World Cup relevant?? I suppose to the Rugby League fraternity it is very relevant and they want it to be successful and have more competitive nations. However on a World scale it is very limited in its exposure and appeal. If Australia loose it will be a shock defeat.
In almost all countries apart from Australia, League is not the dominant football code. New Zealand is totally dominated by that other game, Rugby Union. Another World Cup where a dozen nations turn up and it will be between maybe 4 nations as to who wins it.
Cricket has about 6 competitive nations, although it is big amongst 1/4 of th
e Worlds population. There is even talk of 20-20 Cricket becoming an Olympic Sport.
Americans call the winners of their domestic, Baseball, Basketball, Ice Hockey and Gridiron competitions, “World Champions”. They don’t even invite anyone else from around the world to play except for Canada.
In Football we have 200+ nations playing matches for up to 2 years just to qualify fir the FIFA World Cup where 32 nations battle it out to be World Champions.
South AFrica 2010, here we come
Cheers
Tezza
October 22 2008 | General | No Comments »
Congratulations Westfield Matildas - ASEAN Champions
Last night in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, our Matildas won the Final of the AFF Womens Championship 1-0 over the host nation Vietnam. This is 10 days after the Qantas Young Socceroos (U19) boys won their AFF Championship.
These are our first championships in Asia and are a very big deal. This shows that becoming a member of the AFC was the right decision. We get more football than we ever did and it is of high quality as well.
For the record the ASEAN Football Federation is a small group within the AFC comprising of 11 countries in SE Asia. Australia is NOT a member and were invited into the tournament. It would also appear that 3 nations were not represented at this tournament. And just for the record, Vietnam have won the past 2 tournaments so this is a very good win for the Aussies.
The girls now come home for the start of the Westfield W League here in Australia. These are exciting times for Australian Football both Internationally and domestically.
October 21 2008 | Matildas | No Comments »
Do we Need Video Refereeing in Football?
This was raised here on the weekend after an A-League match between the Qld Roar and Adelaide United. The match ended with a 1-0 away win to Adelaide. The goal scorer was shown to be offside on the video replay. Both the Assistant and Match referee missed it and the goal stands along with the result.
Why do we need a Video Referee?
So these types of things will not happen any more and results of matches in professional leagues will not be affected by an officials mistake.
NO
I am in the NO corner on this one.
Frank Farina came out after the match on Friday night and launched a scathing attack on the officials for missing this one. The effect is that the Roar are now in 6th position, 1 point out of the top four where they could have been equal 4th on points.
My question is, Did Frank Farina publicly blasted Andrew Packer for miss kicking the the ball for Robbie Cornthwaite to run on to and score the goal? No, he would have said something like, “these things happen in Football”. Yes he is right and Cristiano was offside.
The fact is in this particular match Qld had a number of chances to score goals before this happened as well as after this happened. Did he blast his strikers for NOT scoring? NO. It is the game of Football where goals are missed by cm. In this case it was another good display from Qld on the pitch at home but could not score a goal.
Referees are just a part of the game like players and Managers. And they can all make a mistake that cost a team the game.
Video Refereeing stops what is a free flowing game. Should then the referee “STOP” his watch whilst the Video ref takes his time to adjudicate? At the moment the “time added on” is monitored by the 4th official who then tells the ref how much longer. It is always rounded to the nearest minute.
I know Frank is only suggesting this for when a Goal is scored and he wants to check for Handball, offside or if the ball crossed the line, but I think this takes away from the game itself.
Just like every other Australian Football fan back in June 2006, I was livid at the referee decision that lead to the Italians gaining a penalty with a minute to go and eventually won them the game. I was shouting at the TV at a pub in London all sorts of profanity. Did I want a video decision? NO.
In the end Football is a game played by humans and refereed by humans, and humans make mistakes.
What do you think? Leave a message.
Cheers
Tezza
October 20 2008 | General | No Comments »
4-0 to the Socceroos
A very important home win to the Aussies which sees us sitting at the top of the group 2 points ahead of Qatar and Japan, who surprisingly had a Home draw to Uzbekistan.
We had a lot to be excited about on Wednesday night.
Tim Cahill - Returned after a lengthy injury and just like he did for Everton, Timmy slotted the first goal in for the Socceroos. He will be such an important player for us in this campaign.
Craig Moore - Out of retirement and looked like he had not missed a game. Along with Lucas they were rock solid in defense and Quintana had no answer other than to fall on the ground.
Brett Emerton - Just keeps getting better in the right midfield position and although his penalty was not that convincing he slotted goal no 3 with class.
Josh “Jesus” Kennedy - His height was absolutely dominant against the Qataris and the rest of the group should be worried. As well as scoring the 4th goal of the night he had a touch in the first 3 as well.
The squad played very well. We played the ball out of defence and were very patient. I think Pim has been a very settling influence on the team and all looks well for the rest of the group matches.
New Families to Football
In my group on Wednesday night there were 8 of us. 4 of who had NEVER seen a Football match outside of their sons club matches. The Sinclair s came along and I think had a great night despite being dumped on by a huge Thunder Storm pre match. Brendon and Jack just finished their little bike ride across Australia last Friday.
John and Rebecca also came along for their second Socceroos match. They came with me to the Iraq match earlier this year.
New Football Families
It is great to see new faces at the ground and increase the awareness of the sport accross the Aussie public. I would have liked to see more than 34k there on Wednesday night. Pull your fingers out Brisbane and support our National Football team.
Cheers
Tezza
October 18 2008 | General | No Comments »
Australia v Qatar
This Wednesday night will be the second of 8 matches for the Socceroos in round 4 of our World Cup Qualification. I have tickets along with my wife and many friends who have travelled to Brisbane to watch.
We will be without Harry, Bresc and Vinnie but I am confident that we have the stocks to put up a good showing at “Brisbane Stadium”. Tim Cahill is back after a long injury break and Craig Moore has come out of retirement.
Tim is one of the most exciting talents to leave our shores for a career in Europe and I am sure he will delight us on Wednesday night. I think he will be slotted in behind a Josh Kennedy and Scott McDonald strike partnership.
Being an old fullback from back in the day, I have always been a huge Moore fan. I am very excited to see him in the squad. I think Pim has a good headache to have. Chris Coyne has played better each time he has put the Gold Shirt on and I am very impressed. With Uruguayan Sebastian Quintana leading the charge for the Qataris I feel we need a solid central defence and Moores experience would certainly be a huge bonus. However the fitness and speed of Quintana might see the need for a Jade North or Mathew Spiranovic to partner Socceroo Captain Lucas Neil in the centre. I am glad it is Pims choice and not mine.
I can’t wait for Wednesday night. It has been nearly 4 months since our last Live match here in Australia. I think there are still some tickets left but hopefully it will be close to being full. Come on you Queenslanders show Australia how good a crowd we are at Supporting the premier International Football team in this country.
Cheers
Tezza
October 14 2008 | Socceroos and World Cup | 2 Comments »
Hi all, I know it’s been a while. In fact it has been a whole month and looking at my Google Analytics it appears I am writing for myself. I have officially reached Zero readers.
WHY?
I started writing this blog to spread my enthusiasim for watching the Socceroos and hopefully encourage others to follow them or whatever team that interested you. It is harder than I thought it would be and combined with a disrupted employment regime in the past few months, I have just dropped the ball all together here.
WHAT NOW?
What I will be doing is writing for myself in the future. It will be a release. I have always cared what people think about me and what I say. I know I don’t say things just so I don’t make waves. I think a 40 something man just has to be able to say “stuff it” and say what I damn well want to.
AFTER ALL IT IS MY BLOG
So if you have comments, please leave them. I may agree or disagree with you, but rest assured, this is NOT a democracy here, it is MY opinion.
Cheers
Tezza
October 13 2008 | General | 4 Comments »
