FA\u2019s answer to ex-Socceroos skipper\u2019s emotional call for a football identity: It\u2019s \u2018one thing missing in Australia\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cThere\u2019s no doubt about it. Other nations increase the investment. We are not a sport code that is funded by pokies in order to continue and we want to win in knockout stages. We want to go deeper into the tournament. What that will require is an increased investment into the game.<\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\n
\u201cFrom one end from the commercial partners, but definitely also increased investment and support by the governments. And that is one part and we\u2019ve been talking about that home of football, but that will be not enough.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to increase our investment in our pathways, in our talents, we have to broaden the pipeline of talents coming through, coach education, all of those components that will make us successful in the future and what we want to achieve is more successful in the future.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo that increased support and investment will be required.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlso for grassroots we\u2019ve talked about that in grassroots, we want all the kids playing. How many kids will be inspired after this to pick up a ball, go with their parents to a park and kick the ball, join a club? But if we want to continue being successful, then we need that increased investment.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I think bringing me back to the point earlier, what football can do for this nation to unite all the communities is very unique.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf anyone needed a reminder for that, this World Cup was a reminder. How many people were following, what the power of football is and for that we need the support of the government.\u201d<\/p>\n
But, this is a plea and message we\u2019ve heard before \u2013 are politicians listening?<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why I\u2019m saying if anyone needed a reminder, just look at the live sites, look at the schools, look at the families watching at home, look at the viewing numbers that we had on broadcast. But we know even though politicians weren\u2019t traveling here they were supporting the game, right? They were following, they were supporting the game, and we have a lot of support.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd it is also on us to work with the government and reiterate the strength and the power that this game has for Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
While Football Australia has tentpole events like the friendly against Brazil, an Asian Cup and the Women\u2019s World Cup in Brazil to keep momentum going, the challenge lies in whether the A-League is capable of seizing the moment \u2013 something it failed to do in 2022 and 2023, with incidents sending momentum backwards. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe have got the professional clubs and some professional clubs also traveled with us at the World Cup and there\u2019s definitely the intent, the plans together with the A-League, how to harness that success.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut again, it means we all have to work together. And the signs have been very positive. We have put a lot of the historic issues to bed before the World Cup, which enables us to really have a fresh start for Steve (Rosich, APL CEO) and and myself, and the teams around us to work together in how do we exactly as you say harness that success that the Socceroos have have built, the momentum that we have built into the next A-League season, into the next Australia Cup season, but also for all our community football and all our NPL clubs as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DALLAS, TEXAS \u2014 Football Australia Chief Executive Officer Martin Kugeler promises to seize the moment after the Socceroos\u2019…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":779815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44067,329907,44],"class_list":["post-779814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football-australia","tag-martin-kugeler","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=779814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/779815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=779814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=779814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=779814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}