The high comedy on the Gold Coast continues – this week club owner Clive Palmer declared that a teenaged debutante would captain the side against Heart, then suspended head coach Miron Bleiberg for suggesting that the boy would be captain in name only.
Meanwhile, we’re told that Gold Coast players are more interested in selling their homes and finding deals elsewhere in the league (star forward James Brown has already signed with the Jets for next season) than in playing games. Let’s not forget that the entire Gold Coast squad is out of contract in March – and the club has stated that new contracts won’t be signed until after that time.
There’s also the little matter that Clive doesn’t believe contracts are worth the paper they are written on anyway – just ask Robson or Peter Perchtold, both of whom were ‘released’ from their deals without compensation. Ben Buckley, the man charged with looking after the game, popped his head out of his office for a few minutes this week to claim that “All of these little cameos are just part of the soap opera that sport is.”
To be fair, he may not have been talking about the Gold Coast – he may have been referring to the continuing problems at the Mariners (trading insolvent whilst waiting desperately for the Russians to save them), or possibly the standard of refereeing in the A-League, or perhaps the decision to play an unattractive international against Saudi Arabia in the middle of the night.
Or perhaps the Smith Report, which politely but clearly pointed a long finger at the FFA’s financial mismanagement of the game in Australia. Back to Clive Palmer and the Gold Coast though.
There have been claims that Clive is turning the A-League into a laughing stock. Some have suggested that he’s throwing his (considerable) weight around, trying to show everyone who’s the boss. Palmer, for the record, has gone on record stating that owners should have more say, and that he would gladly help bankroll the entire league if that was the case. Tony Sage (Perth Glory) and Nathan Tinkler (Newcastle Jets) have made similar suggestions. So is Clive merely demonstrating that the FFA are actually relatively powerless in the current environment.
They can’t kick him out, because without him there is no Gold Coast, and without Gold Coast the A-League is a 9 team league (there was talk this week of a revived West Sydney, but without a backer that’s a pipe-dream). With the TV negotiations in progress the FFA simply can’t afford to drop a game per week. My theory – for what it’s worth – is that the FFA are missing a trick. Every good soap opera needs a villain. The one we love to hate. Why not let Clive do whatever he likes – but rather than calm the troubled waters – stir them up. Make Gold Coast the club everyone wants to beat – create a siege mentality. It could hardly drive anyone away from the club, and it might just pull a few in.
