This should be all about Saturday afternoon's W-League grand final between Sydney FC and Perth Glory.

It should be about the Glory's quest to win a first W-League title and Sydney FC's desperation to make amends for last season's grand final loss to Melbourne City.

It should be about the anticipated shootout between Glory striker Sam Kerr, fresh from a semi-final hat-trick, and her Matildas teammate Caitlin Foord.

It should be about the intriguing all-American midfield battle between Glory's Nikki Stanton and Sydney FC's Danielle Colaprico.

We should be licking our lips in anticipation of a marquee game featuring two free-scoring teams and some of Australia — and the world's — finest players.

FFA's off-field issues have taken attention away from Saturday's W-League grand final. ( AAP: George Salpigtidis )

But this is Australian football so, as usual, the talk is not about the game.

It is about the byzantine politics and questionable decision making that too often diminishes a sport with enormous grassroots participation, passionate fans and unequalled global connections.

It is, most particularly, about Football Federation Australia (FFA), an organisation that somehow turned a $50 million World Cup bid into a weeping sore that oozed desperation, scandal and abject failure until the game's political capital was destroyed.

It is about a governing body that started a national men's league with bright prospects yet somehow failed to leverage this into consistent growth and — most importantly — the media and sponsorship revenue needed to fund the game at all levels.

It is about the powerbrokers who appointed a Socceroos coach, Ange Postecoglou, who delivered the Asian Cup trophy and World Cup qualification, yet who walked away disillusioned by broken promises about investment in development and wounded by the knives in his back.

And now it is about the former Matildas coach Alen Stajcic who would normally be sitting in the grandstand on Saturday running an eye over members of his World Cup squad, but who was sacked for reasons no-one can — or will — satisfactorily explain.

Those who know Stajcic say he would not have intended to take the limelight from the W-League grand final with a round of media appearances this week that cast the FFA in a now characteristically dim light.

Sorry, this video has expired Alen Stajcic speaks out about his shock sacking as Matildas coach (Pic: AAP)

Yet not only have Stajcic's emotional words and obvious distress diverted eyes from the playing field, they have lit a torch beneath the administration which remains in an invidious place until it can justify his removal.

Quite simply: if the reasons for Stajcic's sacking were so compelling he had to be axed just months before a World Cup, why didn't those around and above the coach know and act sooner?

Alternatively: if there is no compelling justification, how did player and staff surveys and interviews intended to gain constructive feedback (at least as far as the players believed) to improve the team environment suddenly provide a case for dismissal?

For weeks now this credibility gap has invited conspiracy theories and innuendo, which the FFA has only intensified with unilluminating corporate cliches.

The players, it was initially supposed were so deeply traumatised by Stajcic's methods the FFA had no choice but to remove him, have not come forward.

Quite the contrary, those players who have spoken lament Stajcic's sacking, claim that they would have answered the survey questions differently if they knew his job was on the line and — in some cases — secretly confide that the World Cup can't be won without their long-time mentor.

FFA's loss of direction calls for major upheaval

Stajcic understandably believes his reputation has been destroyed. Yet, if public sentiment is a measure the FFA's has suffered even greater damage from its self-inflicted wounds.

Whether FFA chief executive David Gallop has been caught between board politics and administrative red tape, or in a mess of his own making, he has seemed frozen in the spotlight. Unable to justify Stajcic's sacking or robustly defend the process that led to it.

It is just the FFA's luck that, as it flounders, a candidate who was actively discouraged from contesting the recent board election has emerged as the game's most revered figure.

Craig Foster's wonderful campaign to have political refugee Hakeem al-Araibi rescued from a Thai prison and potential deportation to Bahrain have held an unflattering mirror to the FFA's recent performance.

Craig Foster's (left) involvement in the campaign to free Hakeem al-Araibi showed outstanding leadership. ( ABC News: Iskhandar Razak )

You might dismiss Foster's tireless efforts as those of a classic "single-issue candidate" excelling before the cameras when — as the grey suits constantly claimed during the FFA board election — "the game needs strong business experience".

Yet Foster's passion, energy and engagement with the wider football community are what have been missing from the game's governance and administration during a time when some fans have become disillusioned by the feeling football treats them as numbers, not assets.

Foster's "man of the people" persona is in stark contrast to the now-isolated position of Gallop who no longer has one Lowy or another to take the heat on the presumption the chief executive is merely dancing to his employers' tune.

There are now loud calls from the game's broader stakeholders for an investigation into the game's administration, with the A-League clubs and some states no longer tied to the FFA's apron strings.

So as the ball-tampering scandal brought widespread change at Cricket Australia, Stajcic's sacking — when added to the pile of grievances cited by those who believe Australian football has lost direction — could prove the catalyst for major upheaval.

Meanwhile, there is a W-League grand final to be played; another reminder of all that is good about Australian football and, equally, the game's ability to stuff things up.