Football: The Edge project

Ryan Thomas, left, and Jesse Edge, Player of the Year and Players' Player respectively at Melville United's 2012 prizegiving. Thomas was the Northern Premier League's player of the Year that season.

When Jesse Edge was this week named in the All Whites it marked a remarkable hat trick of senior national football call-ups for teenagers developed by his uncle, Declan Edge.

Jesse, with Vicenza Calcio in Italy's Serie B, has joined his former Waikato FC and Melville United team mates Ryan Thomas (now PEC Zwolle) and Tyler Boyd (now Wellington Phoenix) in the new-look All Whites squad announced by coach Anthony Hudson.

Hudson has set a target of qualifying for the 2018 World Cup in Russia and has begun shaping and building a team with that objective foremost in his mind.

But Edge, a former All White with 26 full caps, who these days is head coach at the Ole Football Academy in Porirua, isn't getting too excited about the call-up of his nephew, who he coached daily - just Christmas days off - for over eight years, mostly at Melville United's Gower Park in Hamilton, alongside Boyd and Thomas.

"It is actually very easy to produce players for the national team," Declan said. "I played for New Zealand - it is not that difficult, and we should not think of it as a big deal.

"What is difficult is to produce players capable of playing in a top league and forging a professional career in Europe. That is just a different level."

In that respect Edge doesn't see anything particularly radical about what Hudson is doing in selecting an exceptionally young All Whites squad drawn mostly from players with pro contracts.

"Do you know how hard it is to be a pro player in Europe? You have not only got to be pretty good but you also have to have the support and backing of a whole lot of people who really believe in you.

"We have these young boys in Europe, they're still learning Dutch and Italian, they don't understand the jokes in the dressing room, and they're living in a foreign culture.

"But they are making it work. What Ryan Thomas is doing at PEC Zwolle is unprecedented. He's the hottest young thing in European football.

"Hudson is essentially just banking on some pretty smart people in Europe."

However Edge declined to fully endorse Hudson's seismic All Whites shake-up.

"Let's see in two years," he said. "You have to remember that every time we have a new national coach, a new director of football, a new Phoenix coach, we talk about the 'new' revolution.

"And so far every time it has come to nothing. It's been same, same, same, and the game here is still in chaos. But in football you must always be optimistic."

Jesse is currently playing as a central defender for Vicenza, after playing everywhere from left back to central midfield to left wing to striker when with Waikato FC (national league) and Melville United (northern league)

But Declan declined to express a view on his best position. "I don't pay his wages, so it's not for me to say."

Is Jesse ready for the All Whites? Declan: "We'll find out".

Former Waikato FC coach Declan Edge.

What is known is that Jesse's All Whites call-up is a far cry from seven years ago when Declan drew mocking derision from the wider football community as he embarked upon a plan to develop a group of young Waikato-Bay of Plenty kids into world class players with his personalised daily academy programme.

After years of ridicule he can now say "told you so".

"People laughed at me, but that is what I have done.

"I recall saying 'this is how we will do it'. And the response: 'everyone said who the f... does he think he is?' But these boys were not flukes. It can be done.

"I also remember urging people to come and see these lads in Hamilton because one day it would cost a lot of money to see them. Well, I was at Ajax a couple of weeks ago watching Ryan Thomas and it was 65 Euros a ticket."

Meanwhile as a coach Edge has travelled his own Road to Damascus, with a dramatic shift since in his philosophy over the past 10 years.

When he first took on the role of coach at Waikato FC back in 2004-05 his team played a very simple 4-4-2 formation.

"Our targetmen hit the channels for balls pinged in behind the fullbacks and either latched onto it, or we exploited defensive mistakes. It was very effective, and we easily made the playoffs in playing this style.

"The problem is, while this approach can often return results at national league level, it will seldom make any impact further up the food chain, and will certainly not produce the type of player capable of making an impact at international level or gaining a foothold in professional ranks.

"When we look at the New Zealand U-23s, U-20s, U-17s and the All Whites, what player do we want more of? Ryan Thomas, or somebody with a big engine and physical prowess?

"It's not that the traditional big-hearted, highly motivated but relatively low-skilled Kiwi player isn't useful. It's just that we have too many of them."

Similarly, Edge believes we have a surplus of "old-school" coaches.

"I often listen to fellow coaches talk about passing football, circulating the ball and being patient. But in practice so regularly I find their teams reverting to cynical professional fouls.

"My question is, if these coaches are so good why do they not set up to out-pass and out-circulate, rather than seek to thwart and nobble?

"The interesting thing I have found in recent years is senior players really do not want to play that way. They actually want to play fair and pass the ball around without mindless kicking and resorting to poor tactics. There is a fundamental culture to the game which most players enjoy.

"This 'English' style is not the way forward for us. At least the English and Scottish know they have a huge problems with their style at international level, but we need to be having that discussion a lot more in New Zealand.

"We need to be cogniscant of how the game is evolving globally."

When Declan began his second spell coaching Waikato FC in 2011-12 and controversially populated his squad with his own academy players, vitriol on social media was at its height, and at one point he even banned his charges from using the internet, fearing it would sap their confidence.

Certainly, looking back, some posts on the Yellow Fever forum have not dated well. For instance, here's 'Intheknow' from November 29, 2011.

"Waikato is a joke this season. How the f**k is Ryan Thomas in the squad? He's about 3 apples tall and Declan's got him playing centre mid?... You could practically walk faster than Jesse Edge."

Edge also noted there has been very little acknowledgement of his coaching results from NZ Football.

"I've never been invited to do anything with the U17s, the U20s, or the Phoenix. But now overseas they're saying: 'come and work here'."

When asked who might be next to be called up to the All Whites, Declan couldn't help but note the progress of his own son.

"Harry (Edge) is doing very well in the PEC Zwolle Reserves."