Show caption Steven Lowy went on the front foot against the A-League club owners over the weekend, days before a Fifa delegation are due in Australia to resolve governance issues. Photograph: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images Steven Lowy's incendiary attack only serves to highlight FFA inactivity Jonathan Howcroft Unwittingly the FFA chairman has shone a light on the inertia that has paralysed FFA in recent years, inaction that has ultimately brought about this crisis @JPHowcroft Sun 6 Aug 2017 19.00 BST Share on Facebook

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Football Federation Australia chairman Steven Lowy launched a withering attack on the “self-interest” of A-League club owners on Saturday morning, marking the conclusion of a phoney war that has been raging behind the scenes for months. The arrival this week of a Fifa delegation to resolve long-standing governance issues has brought hostilities into the open.



At the heart of the 2,000-word manifesto is a simple theme – trust. Lowy champions a decade of growth and stability, overseen by a safe hand on the tiller. He concedes changes are required to FFA’s congress and the A-League’s operating model, but with a warning these should not be hijacked by “narrow interests”. References to “the bad old days” and “chaos” stud the missive without trigger warnings, and there’s a pointed reference to the number of clubs headquartered outside Australia.



It is an uncharacteristically incendiary tactic from a man who has displayed little appetite for a fight since he inherited his father’s office almost two years ago. It is a welcome development in many respects, providing a clear frame of reference to the latest rancorous chapter in Australian football’s history.



Unwittingly the statement also highlights the inertia that has paralysed FFA for the past two years, inaction that has ultimately brought about this crisis. Spot fires have emerged all over the place during the current chairman’s tenure, notably the issues of Congress representation, A-League expansion, promotion and relegation, player development, revenue share, and revenue growth - featuring a major focus on TV rights, trumpeted in the statement as “the best broadcasting deal football has ever seen” but met with disdain in clubland. By failing to address each in isolation, all the while demonstrating an apparent lack of ambition or gumption, FFA is now assailed on many fronts with diminished authority, handicapped by a paucity of funds and goodwill to pursue the changes the game is crying out for.



This inactivity has created a monster. A-League clubs, long perceived as only interested in their own backyards have rallied around the banner of the Australian Professional Football Clubs Association. This is fronted by Adelaide United chairman Greg Griffin but underpinned by the powerful City Football Group and comes with a close working relationship with Professional Footballers Australia. “I can comfortably speak on behalf of my club peers when I say that at this moment, there is a real commonality between all of us,” Melbourne City vice chairman Simon Pearce said last week in a call to arms in advance of Fifa’s arrival.

The work this coalition has undertaken behind the scenes has led to a firm belief A-League clubs are being short-changed by the status quo. A view only enhanced by FFA’s refusal to open their books to close scrutiny. Moreover, their frustration at perceived undervalued commercial deals and below expectation revenue redistribution has grown into disenchantment with the overall management of the game in Australia.

For now the APFCA is seeking only to resolve the governance impasse with Fifa, but when Pearce spoke last week he touched on aspects of an alternative vision for the A-League, one founded on creating “the best possible football competition”.

“A competitive league creates tension that drives up the standard of youth training,” he said, using the example of Aaron Mooy to illustrate the message that “supporting and developing footballing pathways in a commercially sustainable way is our greatest responsibility and our greatest opportunity.” It was a nod to the fear soon voiced by Lowy that the naked self interest of A-League clubs should not be trusted as it risks damaging the grassroots. By contrast, the clubs are confident that by incentivising the production line everyone stands to gain from raised standards.

A strong FFA could dismiss all this as a power grab, or harness the entrepreneurial spirit for mutual benefit, but faced with such widespread criticism of its own agenda it is staring at a de facto referendum on its leadership of football in Australia. What could have been dealt with as an in-house commercial negotiation has spilled into a governance crisis with previously muted voices joining the chorus of discontent. In this context Lowy’s statement is a plaintive cry to the footballing public that however bad things seem they could be a whole lot worse. This battle for hearts and minds will fuel the coming months.

Into this terrain strides Fifa in a bid to untangle the Congress imbroglio. FFA is unwilling to relinquish more than 25% of voting power to A-League clubs to prevent them from achieving a bloc threshold with the power to derail motions. Fifa’s job this week is to hear from all concerned parties and figure out a compromise before a 30 November deadline. Should that fail, they could compel the existing board to disband.

Fifa’s intervention is by definition important in the battle for overt control of the local game but it will also indicate the locus of power behind the throne. Lowy inhabits an office with status and as such can stride confidently through the corridors of power, at home and in Zurich, while via Westfield he can call on considerable ‘soft’ diplomatic influence. Ordinarily this would be enough to strongarm local dissent, but the CFG represents a very different foe and their considerable global clout will come to the fore. Both sides are bringing guns to a knife-fight.

What happens this week will set the tone for everything that follows. Lowy’s Peeverish statement statement reads as the first skirmish in a protracted war; clubs are hopeful Fifa provides a swift and decisive intervention.



Towards the end of Lowy’s statement he addresses perhaps the most tantalising perplexity of the whole situation: after shunning the limelight for so long, why is he now fighting so hard? This is a scion of a billionaire family with significant responsibilities outside football and he’s sticking his neck out for an administration unable to prosecute its agenda at great risk of a bruising and embarrassing coup.