Pim’s Attitude

April 2nd, 2009 | By: Pat | 5 Comments »

An interesting article caught my attention this morning as I perused the Daily Telegraph. Ian Payten wrote an opinion piece commenting on the sudden “holier than thou” attitude of the new age Socceroos. Now, in amongst all the football bashing which the Telegraph regularly engages in (the Rebecca Wilson article, anyone?), this one stood out from the other mindless dribble because I think it actually has legs and Payten is addressing an important aspect of the growing game.

Unlike the Wilson et al pieces which are usually just pointless “sokkah” bashes, Payten’s concerns are a true problem which I’ve noticed myself for a while. Pim Verbeek, for all this coaching abilities and football theories, is not the most personable guy around. Of course, I don’t know him personally and I’m only going by what I see of him in interviews and from his quotes in the papers, but like Payten suggest, Pim isn’t exactly in line to be on Oprah any time soon.

I don’t mind the fact that he’s quiet and keeps to himself – everyone’s got their own personality – but I do mind the almost snobbish attitude he treats the media with. He’s alienating himself from the media and the public, causing a PR nightmare for the FFA. Compare this to the charismatic Guus, whom the whole country loved so much, and you can see exactly what I’m talking about.

Pim’s negative attitude towards the A-League is well documented, and this disdain for the local media seems to stem from that. To me (and I totally welcome all input and feedback on this matter), it seems like he doesn’t believe in the game here. Yes, he’s plodding along getting the job done – getting us to the World Cup – but he doesn’t believe in the future of football in Australia and he isn’t passionate about it. His half assed efforts in interviews suggest that he doesn’t think that we are a cultured football nation, and therefore he shouldn’t waste time with the journo’s.

And the worse aspect of it all is that this negative attitude is seeping through to the team. Providing what Payten said about the Kewell, Cahill, Verbeek interview was true, then this is setting a very bad precedent. I can’t find an online version, but another article in the Telegraph by Josh Taylor today talks about how Josh Kennedy ignored all media at Sydney airport yesterday and refused to give them even the obligatory few minutes.

Football in this country has worked so hard to get to where it is today. The current state of the game has Johnny smiling upstairs and nodding his head while giving us two thumbs up. The media, regardless of what Pim thinks of them, is a vital tool to the continual growth of the game here and we can’t piss them off. After so many decades, football has finally achieved a standing amongst the mainstream media, so the FFA must give something back, and work with them for the sake of our game. We can’t just sit back and think that football has taken off yet, there is still much work to be done, and the media will always play an important role in our future rise or fall.

What do you think? Are you getting the same negative vibe that I’m getting about Pim and the Socceroos? Does Pim have an obligation to promote the sport here? Or should he not care as long as he gets us to the World Cup?

Tags: Pim Verbeek, Socceroos

Australia World Cup RSS Feed

Comments

By Chri | April 4th, 2009 at 9:38 pm

Thats what the guys on sbs have been sayong for god knows how long. All Pim seems to care about it getting the A team to the world cup. We need someone and a system which not only gets us to the world cup, but brings through the joeys and the youth teams into the top team. At the moment this si not happening! i don;t think that there is a negative vibe at all, it’s just that it’s not his job to do it. Yes compared to the Europe, the A-League is very poor, any self-respecting football fan should understand and take that on board but we shoul;dn’t get upset about it. It should give us more desireto become beter footballers. you can say what you want about how ‘delicate’ our game is at the moment but iof we can’;t handle constructive critisism from a world class coach, who is saying that we don’t train with enough intensity and that our techinical knowledge is next to none then WE MUST LISTEN! notsayhe’s destrpying us, he’s just sayiong what nobody else has the guts to say! the sad thing is, that it’s the truth

Posted from Australia

By Pat | April 5th, 2009 at 12:30 am

Chri, I don’t think we are arguing the same thing here. I never attacked Pim for what he said about the game here. Yes, obviously our game is no where near the standard of most European leagues, and there are definitely heaps of room for improvement. I also agree with the fact that despite the growth, our football culture as a nation is still minor compared to other football mad nations, and he therefore doesn’t have the passion he would if was coaching the Netherlands. That’s fine, I’m ok with that. I have no problems with those things he said.

What I am troubled by is Pim’s attitude towards the media. What this post refers to is how this negative attitude towards the media can infact piss them off and lead them to portray football in a negative way again. This was the attitude in the 90’s and early 00’s when football articles would concentrate on crowd violence, ethnic division, bankrupcy, with a tiny sentence at the end of the article telling us what the score was. But the past few years has seen the mainstream media’s view on football change, they’re climbing on the bandwagon and realising that football is a legitimatly popular sport in Australia, and that they need to give it the attention it deserves. They’re interested in what Pim and the Socceroos have to say, how they train, etc, but how are they going to react if Pim and the boys consistantly don’t give them the time of day? Payten’s article said that there is already a feeling of division between The Daily Telegraph and Pim, that Pim’s not really doing anything to try and fix it, and that their (the journo’s) patience are beginning to wear thin. That’s the problem I’m referring to in the post, not Pim’s attitude towards our game.

By Mr J | April 5th, 2009 at 8:13 pm

The Josh Kennedy thing is rubbish. Channel 9 showed a clip of him talking to the media in the airport. Sure, it was an informal “walk & talk” interview, but he did speak to them about the game. He didn’t do some bum’s rush through the airport celeb style.

Posted from Australia

By Pat | April 5th, 2009 at 9:41 pm

Mr J, I saw the Kennedy interview on Fox as well the other night, so fair call on that. I don’t know why Josh Taylor would write that article, maybe he didn’t know Kennedy made those comments. But still, guys like Schwarzer and Neill had the manners to drop their bags and field questions, whereas the goal scorer just did the walk and talk. It’s a little bit poor considering he was the main attraction all the journo’s wanted a quote from.

By marco | April 7th, 2009 at 9:28 am

pim’s 1st job is to get us to the world cup and he is doing just that. If we need to get a media friendly person to talk the game up then employ someone else or get Eddie McGuire to do it. This is not so much a joke but if pim has a weak point in talking to the media then get a p r person or a cleb to join the team. When he was appointed manager of Australia I just hoped he would pick up the role that guss did and plan our way to South Africa. I don’t care if journo’s have a problem with him. If he failed to get us to s.a. they would be leading the criticism to get him sacked. Pat I have no problems with journo’s myself I think it would be a great job but pim has his job to do and in his way he is doing it. I can understand your point of view but I do not know one man that can keep everyone happy and still have Australia qualify for every comp at all age levels.

Football is a team game.

pat I have enjoyed your article and like the debate it has given.

Posted from United Kingdom