Australian Penthouse

MR FOOTBALL

SBS TV presenter Les Murray has been the face of soccer in Australia for 30 years.
With the World Cup finally here, Penthouse chats to ‘Mr Football’ about his passion
for the world game, and asks him to rate the Socceroos’ chances in South Africa

After all these years, do you still get excited going into a World Cup?
Absolutely, especially when I support a team, which is rare for me because I’m a journalist and I can’t afford to be a passionate supporter of teams. I don’t have any club teams that I congenitally support; I just love the game. But the one team I do follow passionately is the Socceroos, so if they score a goal, I jump up and hit the ceiling just like any other fan.

Even though the Socceroos have been successful under Dutch coach Pim Verbeek, he has been criticised for not promoting attacking, entertaining football. What do you think of his style?
I think it’ll do for now, but I don’t think ultimately there’s a future in playing so cautiously because everybody’s dream is not to be the underdog, but the favourite. And that’s the long-term dream, whether it takes 10, 20 or 30 years. I believe Australia should strive to be a top international football nation. Another thing is the Australian mentality is very different to most cultures, in that Australians not only love to have a go, but they have the bravery to have a go, and I think if you play too defensively, you are putting the brakes on a natural instinct which can be a very powerful resource. I think [Guus] Hiddink understood that very well, and he did on occasion unleash the Australians. Notably, we attacked Brazil in the 2006 World Cup; we lost, but I think unluckily. I’m not sure whether Verbeek has that kind of bravery, but hopefully he can do something in the World Cup.

How far do you think the Socceroos can go in South Africa?
Out of the three games we have in the group – against Germany, Ghana and Serbia – we’re going to have to win at least one of them, if not two. I see it as a very similar group to the one in Germany, and I don’t think to suggest that this is some super-tough group should be an excuse for us not to get out of it.

Who are our key players?
Harry Kewell, Brett Emerton, Mark Bresciano, Vince Grella, Scott Chipperfield, Craig Moore and Mark Schwarzer are all key players, but this World Cup will be their swan song. As Pim [Verbeek] likes to point out, they’re four years more experienced than they were in Germany, but he neglects to mention they’re also four years older. Obviously, Timmy Cahill is a bit younger, so he might be around for the next World Cup. The one we’ll be missing big time is Mark Viduka. If we play the Dutch way, which is essentially a lone striker with a couple of flankers coming from behind and a deeper midfielder, then that centre-forward role is very specialised. It’s not so much a goalscorer’s role as it is an instrument of bringing other people into play, and Viduka understood that very well. We don’t have a replacement.

What’s the Socceroos’ greatest trait?
It’s the old Australian quality of never giving up. Guus Hiddink said to his assistant Graham Arnold after we came back against Japan in Germany to score three goals in eight minutes that only an Australian team could have done it. It’s that character and self-belief that’s an enormous resource for coaches. That’s our biggest asset.

And their greatest weakness?
The weakness has always been tactical sophistication, and even technique. This is a so-called ‘golden generation’ of players, but let’s not forget that even they grew up in a technical culture where ball technique was not considered important, and it’s a malady that is only now being addressed with the eight, nine and 10-year-olds. And it’s also about tactical sophistication. Our technical knowledge is entirely based on experience at professional level, whereas in Europe kids are taught technical nous from 12 or 13 onwards. So that is what Hiddink found when he first came in, and that’s what he worked to correct. I think the players learned a lot from that, so it’s not as bad as it used to be.

Which team is your pick for the Cup?
There are two that stand out head and shoulders from the others, and they are Spain and Brazil. Spain has a fantastic generation of players and a fantastic development culture, and the most potent way to win is the way Barcelona and other Spanish teams play. If they can carry that into the World Cup, without cracking under any mental pressures, then they’ll win it. But I’ve seen too many roaring favourites fail, going back to the 1954 World Cup when Hungary was beaten by a very ordinary West Germany in the final, so if you forced me to place a bet, I would put money on Brazil before I put it on Spain. Brazil has won five World Cups, so they’ve got the experience and they know how to do it.

Who are the players to watch?
Obviously, the one to look at if you’re not a regular viewer of football is the diminutive Argentinean Lionel Messi. Some people are now saying he’s the greatest player of all time, but the problem is I don’t think Diego Maradona, who’s Argentina’s coach, has been able to harness for Argentina what Barcelona has been able to harness with him at club level.

Should Maradona be the Argentina coach?
No. Maradona is an iconic legend and the best player I’ve ever seen, but as a coach he’s almost in the amateur ranks, in my opinion. He should be a figurehead and have seriously competent assistants calling the shots when it comes to tactics and selection, but he refuses to do that because he’s Diego!

Are you confident South Africa can host a successful World Cup?
From what I’ve seen, yes. I’ve been there twice in the last year and the national enthusiasm for the World Cup is fantastic. At the draw, they closed off the main street in Cape Town for a fan fest and expected maybe 5,000 people to turn up, but 30,000 arrived. The stadiums are ready, so the only question marks are things like security – the police presence has been beefed up enormously already – and some infrastructure issues like transport.

What are you most looking forward to in South Africa?
To me, the World Cup is always flavoured by the host nation. My favourite memory of the first World Cup to be held in Asia in 2002 is of the Korean fans and that sea of red. The world became enamoured by the Koreans and Japanese, and that’s what it will be remembered for, not for Brazil’s victory. So I’m hoping that the rhythm of Africa, in a human sense, will reverberate through this World Cup.

Was the 2006 World Cup in Germany more special to you than any other because of Australia’s involvement?
Absolutely. You know, five World Cups before that without Australian involvement was extremely painful and frustrating, and that equaliser by Harry Kewell against Croatia to take us into the knock-out phase was probably the most satisfying football moment of my life.

Is it too optimistic to believe Australia can host the Cup in 2018 or 2022?
No, I don’t think so, but it’s more likely to be 2022. Particularly if Europe gets 2018, there’s every reason why we should get ’22. There are nine bidders for the World Cup and every one of them will be capable of holding it, but two things will come into play: one will be politics, and the more important one will be the legacy. FIFA wants a legacy out of every World Cup, and I think an Australian World Cup would leave a far bigger legacy than probably any of the other applicants. We are in the biggest growth area for football in the world. If you look at the top 10 television audiences for the 2006 World Cup, four were Asian countries – China, Japan, Vietnam and Indonesia – and they are all in our region and time zone. FIFA is not unaware of that, so if you’re going to propagate the beautiful game, you have to take the World Cup to this region occasionally.

What are your thoughts on other football codes protesting about us hosting the Cup?
I think it’s just a lot of public posturing and sabre rattling. There is this rather archaic, caveman mentality still lingering in Australia, where sports are rivals to each other and if you’re a fan of one game, you’re not supposed to be a fan of another game. That is utter rubbish. In 21st century Australia, you and I can follow four or five different sports at the same time. Like Frank Lowy says, the World Cup is not just for football, it’s for Australia. It supersedes just being a sporting event, it’s a festival of cultural diversity which has a massive impact around the world, so everybody benefits, including the other sports.

Could Australia win the World Cup in 2022?
If we produce players of international quality by 2022, and you mix that with our winning mentality and home support, we should be able to win it. No bullshit about not being disgraced and all this crap, we have to aim to win the World Cup in 2022, and we should be genuine contenders to do that. Look at what happened in 2006; we got robbed against Italy! If we’d won that game, we would’ve played the Ukraine, who were crap, and then we would’ve been in the semi-finals of the World Cup. So why shouldn’t we do it in 2022?

Do you think SBS has been given the credit its due for popularising football in Australia?
Generally, I think so. I’ve never met anybody in the football world who denies it. We live in an age which is very different from when SBS started, where now we have serious competition for television football content. It’s new money in this country and big business wants to cash in. SBS has the World Cup not just for 2010, but for 2014 as well, so we are still big players, and we have other big properties like the Champions League, which is the highest-quality product in the world on an annual basis.

What is the future of football at SBS?
Football is very important to the identity of SBS. The fact that it’s a free-to-air network which is dedicated to football gives it an edge because so long as you want to promote football in this country and build its markets, you need free-to-air television that will give it generous air time and news coverage. To that extent, SBS is still the only game in town. The pay TV networks, as good a job as they do, don’t build brands, they just service the existing customer. I’m prepared to pay whatever it is a month to watch football on Foxtel, but I don’t need to be converted. It’s the guy done the road who’s not a football fan who needs to be converted, and he’s not going to pay until he’s converted. Who’s going to convert him? Free-to-air television.

How about your personal future?
Well, SBS apparently still wants me, and I’m there because I still enjoy it. I don’t like to talk about things like retirement any more than I like to talk about death. It’s something that will happen at some point, probably at a time when it’s out of my control.

Have you been tempted to join Fox Sports?
No. The reason I enjoy SBS is that the top brass believe in football, always have, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. So long as my employers take that position, I’m happy to be there. I’ve never dreamed of a move to another network.

You and the late, great Johnny Warren used to talk about ‘the mission’ of making Australia a genuine football country. Is it mission accomplished, or will it ever be?
It’s more accomplished than it’s ever been. If Johnny were here, he would not believe some of what’s happened, but there is still this mindset that we are not a football nation, and I think we need to chip away at that. The dream is not so much to bring the World Cup to Australia, but to win it. Australians don’t like to lose. We’ve won everything else, but we’ve never won the football World Cup. The Socceroos are at the core of this. They are the one medium in football that galvanises and unifies the country. So long as they perform well, we are on the right track to achieving those aims.

How many World Cup games will SBS be showing?
Every game – 64. All of them live, except where kick-off times coincide. But SBS of course have a second channel, where it will place all the replays, so it will be wall-to-wall World Cup. It’s a great time for football. I’m pretty happy with the way of the world at the moment.

Tune in to SBS on Friday, June 11 at 10:00pm EST for the Opening Ceremony and first game of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, live from South Africa.