Michael Cockerill is Football Writer for The Sydney Morning Herald
Forget the debate about whether a salary cap is good or bad for the A-League. The real arm's race has already taken off. It's in the semi-pro ranks of the National Premier Leagues, where competitions in NSW and Victoria in particular are gearing up for day when they might get the chance to join the A-League in their own right.
Enough is enough. Players milk penalties. And yet as the honour system in the A-League disintegrates week-by-week, who gets the blame? Not, mostly, the players. Rather those who are supposed to see it, in a split second. Am I missing something here?
Since Englishman Mike Charlesworth took over four years ago, the "little club that could" has slid dangerously close to the abyss.
Are Sydney FC that good, or is the rest of the A-League that bad?
An inability to sell the message and the increasing unwillingness of the football community to listen has led to this.
Is it time to panic for the women's game in Australia? Not really. Is it time to be bold? For sure. As women's sport across the country enters a golden age, football needs to think outside the square or it could be left behind. Sunday afternoon in Perth will more than likely offer a stark warning. It's one the female game should not ignore.
Brisbane's opponents pay Carlos Tevez $1 million a week, while the Roar can barely afford to participate in the ACL. That's a situation that must change.
The miracle is the explosion of participation in the last decade - the most impressive being in women's football - has occurred in spite of the obvious flaws.
As A-League clubs build for the future and as Football Federation Australia searches fruitlessly for an "Australian way" more than a decade after the great prophet Johnny Warren opined that until our game knew what it stood for it would never work out where it was going, the best lessons to be learnt come from the past.
Where to now for Western Sydney Wanderers? Nowhere, as it turns out.
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