It’s a debate mired in contract or employment law; when you pay somebody’s wages do you have a right to their opinions?
On Wednesday morning Football Federation Australia took the remarkable steps of issuing a press release stating that Socceroos coach Ange Postecoglou had “retracted” his comments from the previous day, in which he had implored both FFA and Professional Footballers Australia to “lay down your guns”.
Irrespective of whether Postecoglou’s comments were borne solely out of frustration or whether they were a targeted dig at his employers, they were nevertheless presumably the heartfelt expression of a coach whose sole preoccupation was to give his team the best possible preparation ahead of two crucial World Cup qualifiers.
Hardly an unreasonable request, most Socceroos fans would agree, and one presumably not warranting “correction”.
On Tuesday, Postecoglou was a national team coach, concerned that a protracted industrial dispute might distract his players’ on-field performances during two deceptively important qualifiers. By Wednesday, Ange’s comments were very much locked in step with the position of his bosses – acknowledging that “the PFA initiated the regrettable situation that has distracted us in Perth” and that the onus is on the players’ union to “undertake that no future Socceroo camp will be targeted in this way”.
It’s an unenviable position for the highly respected coach to be placed in; between the rock of contractual obligation and the hard place of players’ conditions – in less than 24 hours the Socceroos boss has migrated from someone who wasn’t taking sides to Team FFA.
But in persuading this popular figure, whose calls for mutual restraint have been echoed by experienced football writers and would have appeared to most football fans as reasonable, to become part of their PR offensive, have FFA done both Ange Postecoglou and themselves a tremendous disservice?
It becomes harder to intimate that the “other party” is the one being intransigent, inflexible and unreasonable when actions of your own appear draconian, or at best, heavy-handed.
FFA CEO David Gallop has previously accused PFA of spreading “misinformation” stating, “the talk by the PFA of salary cap freezes and having no [legal] protection is nonsense”, and called the decision to boycott commercial appearances as “wrong and against the interests of everyone in the game, including the Socceroos players.”
Nor has PFA chief executive Adam Vivian declined an opportunity to apportion blame in a statement regarding Postecoglou’s retraction.
“The PFA has the utmost respect for Ange Postecoglou”, said Vivian, “The CBA is a critical issue right now for the players and the inability of FFA to show the players respect has ensured that this has dragged on. The PFA understands the head coach’s desire for focus and we will continue to push for an outcome that respects the players’ commitment to the future of the game.”
It’s another low point for relations between the governing body and the players’ union, which have soured considerably since the expiry of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement on 30 June this year; so much so that the longstanding memorandum of understanding between FFA and PFA has effectively been torn up.
To portray the positions of the respective parties as childish bickering though is to grossly understate the importance of what still remains to be resolved – on one hand is the ongoing commercial viability of football in an increasingly crowded sporting landscape, on the other the real and material working conditions of professional players.
Fans in Perth eager to press the flesh with their Socceroo heroes during a rare western sojourn have the right to be aggrieved and feel let down that both FFA and PFA have failed to come to agreement earlier. But whether the continuation of a $2.55 million cap in the A-League for a third season constitutes an effective “salary freeze” or whether “flexibility” provisions (such as a $200,000 additional loyalty player allowance) will effectively enable wage increases to take place remains a significantly important discussion.
Whether there should be a sliding-scale Socceroo match payment that distinguishes key qualifiers from seemingly less important match days is a discussion that’s been rolling since the 2013 East Asian Cup.
If, as the PFA claims, as much as $4.5 million in outstanding remuneration is owed to A-League players across the duration of the A-League era, with claims dating back to the dissolution of Gold Coast United and North Queensland Fury, then this remains a not insignificant conversation, and one in desperate need of resolution.
There are plenty of potential road blocks and stumbling points ahead, and it’s important not to lose sight of the tremendous progress that can be achieved if the next CBA – as a “Whole of Football” understanding encompassing A-League, Socceroos and Matildas conditions – can bring three divergent documents under one standardised agreement.
Building from there, imagine if under the next CBA the W-League might even be included, as the push to provide adequate professional pathways for aspiring Matildas continues.
Given the levels of cooperation and discussion between both parties that is needed for these goals and many more to be achieved it is hard not to consider recent developments as an unnecessary and unwelcome misstep along this pathway.
You don’t get to this endpoint by thinking the war can be won through public relations and brinksmanship, and you don’t get there by asking the national team coach to be a pawn in your game of political chess.
