Chris Rattue: Playoff excitement is music to the ears

Wellington Phoenix fans have been thrilled by their team's successful run this season. Photo / Getty Images

Soccer is suddenly top of the pops - and without a song.

The stunning, exhilarating A-League playoff match in Wellington on Sunday - when the Phoenix beat Perth via a penalty shootout - was as good as sport has been in this country for many a year.

Not since the days when Richard Hadlee was in his prime and one-day cricket on the rise have we witnessed such spontaneous jubilation and a crescendo of noise out of a New Zealand stadium to match the soccer scenes from Wellington this year.

Sunday's wildly enjoyable playoff game was - to be brutally honest - decidedly A-League in standard, but the crowd lifted it way beyond that.

The whole Phoenix organisation deserves a mighty congratulation for the success of this season. Ricki Herbert has pieced together an excellent and entertaining side that has won the hearts of a willing audience.

What a pleasure, to enjoy a real sporting atmosphere, and not one ruined by the sort of musical interludes that have demeaned rugby and cricket.

Yes, there were a few bars of music on Sunday but only as the players prepared for the penalty shootout. This was not down to the Phoenix either, because playoff matches are run by Football Federation Australia (FFA).

Usually, there is some music at the Wellington stadium as the crowd filters into the ground, but that's about all folks.

The crowd is allowed to rule, as it also did so magnificently when the All Whites beat Bahrain to qualify for the World Cup finals.

Swamping sport with pop songs sends out a message all right - that your event can't stand on its own two legs.

Crowds should be left to create their own, genuine, atmosphere - both good and bad. If the game is rubbish, or your team stinks, then a decent round of booing is well in order if the crowd feels so inclined.

As Wellingtonians have shown, sport should be a blank canvas on which you can paint your own atmosphere.

Gaps in the play are there to discuss the game, or make new friends, or scream and yell as you please, and not to have yet another yawn, yawn, yawn Jordan Luck ditty shoved down the ear drums.

Phoenix officials told me the club deliberately canned the music to let the crowd reaction thrive. The Phoenix have been heartily rewarded, including with a stretch of 18 games without defeat at home.

The players have told club boss Tony Pignata that while there may be only 9000 people in the stands sometimes, the number feels more like 20,000.

Yes, soccer's continuity means there are fewer gaps to fill compared to other sports. But we used to revel in rugby and cricket without a faceless DJ implying that we weren't capable of enjoying a sport for the sport's sake.

Roll on the Phoenix, without the rock.

* The FFA must step up the campaign to secure the Phoenix's future in the A-League. Believe it or not, the new darlings of the competition have a licence only until the end of next season, and a threat still hangs over the club's head.

Leading Australian soccer pundit Michael Cockerill yesterday signalled just how much events have turned. Whereas once New Zealand soccer needed help from across the Tasman, the A-League now needs the vibrant Phoenix club and the outstanding Wellington crowds, he wrote.

Only 4000 people turned up to watch Newcastle beat the Gold Coast in a playoff; there were nearly 25,000 at Westpac Stadium on Sunday.

Not only is this a good look for the A-League, which competes in a very tough market, but Football Federation Australia will be doing cartwheels because it takes the risk and profit from playoff games.

The Phoenix estimate that the FFA would have made $770,000 from Sunday's game, and the next semifinal against Newcastle on March 7 is headed for a sellout and will be worth even more.

Australia is in the Asian federation, having quit Oceania. The powerful Asian conference leader Mohammed Bin Hammam wants the Phoenix thrown out of the A-League because New Zealand is in the Oceania region.

Furthermore, should the Phoenix survive he wants them to operate under the standard A-League quota system of five overseas players, with New Zealanders in the Phoenix regarded as overseas players (the Asian Champions League quota is three overseas players - something the Phoenix would happily abide by).

World soccer works hard to promote the game in every country, developing professional leagues while avoiding the creation of soccer ghettos.

These are noble aims and the rules work in most situations.

So Hammam's position is not unreasonable under normal circumstances. But there is no hope of a professional league ever being sustained in New Zealand. And Oceania is so isolated and weak that it makes sense for the region to tap into the strength of Australian and Asian soccer.

The game is battling on quite well as shown by Auckland City doing remarkably well at this year's World Club Championships, although the Phoenix club is starting to cast a long shadow.

The crucial point, however, is that the Phoenix are succeeding beyond many of our wildest dreams. Soccer-mad Kiwi kids have a very tangible professional future to aim for. The world game is finally back on the rise in New Zealand, and to destroy the Phoenix would be to send the game back to the dark ages. To keep waving an axe over the club's head is ridiculous.

Commonsense, you feel, will prevail. Fifa leader Sepp Blatter is in the Phoenix's corner.

But the time has come for resolution. The Phoenix are desperate for security in the form of Asia's approval and the standard 10-year A-League licence. The club needs this, so it can continue to build a squad, satisfy sponsors and keep the game charging forward in this country.

* One day, somewhere, the awful crime will be committed. A top sports person, or a group, will die again at the evil hands of terrorism. This event is such a depressing thought that we are more apt to hide our heads in the sand than accept the inevitability. Such murder is on the cards, as occurred at the 1972 Olympics.

It almost did occur in January, when an assistant coach, driver and media officer perished after scumbags attacked the bus transporting the Togo soccer team in an isolated part of Angola.

Players such as Manchester City star Emmanuel Adebayor could well have died.

Sports bodies need to be very careful when they send teams abroad. It is no longer good enough to hide behind pap claims, such as the one which says terrorism wins if you don't brave the threat of bombs and bullets.

Terrorism also wins when people die. In fact, terror - the real weapon - is magnified then.

If, as the Herald said this week, the various players' associations around the world are about to recommend that cricketers pull out of the Indian Twenty20 league, then this can only be applauded as reasonable and responsible in the current climate.

Sports people should also feel free to withdraw from tours without fear of recrimination, although inevitably there probably will be some.

Somewhere in the world, right now, people will be plotting to kill sports men and women. Sports teams are highly visible and tempting targets for the evildoers. There is no way that their protection can be guaranteed.

To die, as unarmed targets in what is virtually a war zone, would do nothing to stem the tide of terrorism.

Despite the many warnings by security experts, the Sri Lankan cricket team went waltzing into Pakistan a year ago and were met with the sort of attack you would expect from a small army.

Policemen, with families and lives of their own, were slaughtered while protecting the players. Many of the cricketers were injured, and could have been cut down in the hail of bullets, rockets and grenades.

We all hope that the New Zealand hockey team, minus a reluctant Simon Child, and all the other teams are safe at the World Cup in New Delhi. Given the recent threats against sports events in India, and the history of terrorism in the region, you certainly wouldn't bank on it though.

As for our Olympic Games Committee, they are the last people I'd trust to make a decision on whether to send a team to the Commonwealth Games in India.

Any mob which thinks it is okay to send a baby killer to box at Olympic and Commonwealth Games has an appalling sense of judgment and insufficient respect for human life.