You've got to hand it to Nathan Tinkler. The billionaire from Newcastle certainly knows how to poop on a party.

On the day of the A-League season launch in Sydney six months ago the mining magnate ensured the headlines would all be negative for the game and focussed on him when he sacked Branko Culina, the coach of the club he owns, Newcastle Jets.

Today, as the beleaguered FFA looked to let its hair down for at least one night with a glitzy celebration of all that is good in the game at its awards night to honour the best in the game, Tinkler chose to rain on the parade yet again. This time he dropped an even bigger bombshell: that he was handing back the license to operate the Jets.

Nathan Tinkler. Credit:Steve Christo SCZ

Tinkler certainly looks like a man who knows how to throw the toys out of the pram when he doesn't get his own way.

It's a pattern of behaviour that was evident in his early forays into the racing industry, where he spent a king's ransom on yearlings and racehorses but summarily dismissed several trainers, including Group One winning handlers like Mick Price and Anthony Cummings, when he didn't like the way things were going.