A-Leagues’ grand final furore: football’s latest act of self-sabotage is beyond parody | Joey Lynch

It’s beyond parody. Even before Socceroos squad members began to return home from their history-making stint in Doha, sardonic jokes were flying – just how would the local game mess this up? That’s the well-earned cynicism of Australian football. But not even the most jaded would have anticipated it would take just over a week for a self-inflicted existential crisis to materialise.

While it is easy to dismiss the ongoing rancour as just the latest example of Australian football eating itself, it increasingly appears that this is the latest front in the increasingly bitter ideological conflict between fans and administrators over what matters in modern sport, and what’s worth sacrificing.

Beyond the discontent surrounding a grand final, it has become a moment of class consciousness among those who provide the passion and atmosphere, in opposition to those who lay claim to its ownership. Even if the decision was reversed today, anger would likely remain; fans rebelling against those they now believe see them not as partners but as cash registers whose concerns can be discounted when the dollars add up. This is about more than a grand final now.

How the A-Leagues come back from this, if they even can, is difficult to imagine. The indignation of the past days has been driven almost entirely by a sea of collective fans, and there are no definitive leaders to target or schmooze to ease tensions. The media is not driving the conversation so much as being observers holding for dear life.

DaveMilbo Football Australia has released the Gorgon

joeylynchy This is where the decoupling of APL and FA hurts. APL have nothing else to offer. If FA was in charge (not saying that’s a good thing) they could say here’s the Matilda’s farewell before the WWC and the final WC home qualifier for the next 3 cycles as compo whoops we fkd it…

I'm a conspiracy theorist; I half-seriously believe this whole scam was to suck up to Graham Arnold.

Astonishing. Even $$FIFA$$ has not had the temerity nor the stupidity to sell rights to the same host for 3 WCs running. That officials thought this would be remotely acceptable to fans is a mark of how out of touch they are. Or maybe, indeed, they just don't care about fans.

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