Opinion: Soccer needs promoters more than policemen

Hawkes Bay coach Chris Greatholder addresses his side. Photo / Duncan Brown.

When New Zealand Football this week walloped ASB Premiership title contenders Hawke's Bay United with a $2000 fine and docked them of three competition points following an administrative cock-up with a player transfer, it was an occurrence of some note.

Hawke's Bay substitute Harry Edge came off the bench in the 84th minute of Bays' 3-1 win over Wanderers SC at North Harbour Stadium last Sunday but was subsequently ruled ineligible to have played, with his transfer from Wellington soccer club Western Suburbs considered incomplete.

The decision means Hawke's Bay drop from being first equal on points in the summer premiership to fifth place, while Wanderers SC - a new-entry team of teenagers preparing for the Fifa U-20 World Cup in 2015 - have now secured their maiden win in curious circumstances.

It's just the third time in the 10-year history of the current summer league that a match result has been overturned on the basis of player ineligibility.

But more than that, it is something which highlights both the strengths and weaknesses of the code in New Zealand at the moment.

Given no actual protest was lodged from any quarter, spotting the procedural error in Edge's transfer - requested on the Thursday, but not signed off by the Sunday - must be credited to some fine detective work by New Zealand Football staff.

Their actions have arguably preserved the integrity of our flagship competition and underlined just what a serious league this is. Player registration has always been a black and white affair in football. Just as you can't be a little bit pregnant, nor can you be a little bit transferred.

But for all that, the episode also hints at a few of the things that are not quite right with our domestic showpiece.

The status of the premiership has slipped considerably from the fanfare of its launch in 2004, when there was a weekly highlights Sky TV programme, you could catch live crossovers and score updates of all matches on AM radio, and crowds actually queued at some gates. Venues such as Waikato Stadium, The Trusts Stadium and Newtown Park hosted matches and major newspapers would usually have a reporter at Auckland games.

Not these days. Indeed, the harsh reality is the mana of the premiership has dwindled to the extent that experienced football commentator Sam Malcolmson was recently able to get away with describing the standard as "dismal" in the media without even being challenged to substantiate the claim.

Rather than employing very effective policemen, New Zealand Football urgently needs to invest far greater time and resources into marketing, promotion, and sponsorship of the ASB Premiership.

Just how deep this need runs can be traced to a meeting of ASB Premiership club chairmen back in June 2012, where they bluntly told New Zealand Football they had lost faith in the ability of former league manager Glyn Taylor to do his job.

It was nothing personal, they just noted Taylor - who finally resigned last year - was tied up with so many other tasks he didn't have the time to devote dedicated leadership to promoting the league and supporting the franchises.

But for all that, it must be said Taylor always found the time to spot infringements and disburse fines, and in this respect perhaps the game only has itself to blame.

Football boasts an extremely punitive regulatory regime. No other amateur code in New Zealand beats itself up financially as much as football, with fines, penalties and forfeitures. Indeed, the word "fine" appears 33 times in NZF's Regulation 10, which covers the national league, with penalties of up to $10,000.

Add in player cautions of $25 a time, and $75 for red cards, and the game has a brilliant formula for stripping money from the coalface where it is needed most.

And while NZ Football goes to great lengths to emphasise the ASB Premership is a non-professional competition, the Hawke's Bay experience shows sorting player registration and transfers in football is an unforgiving business and certainly no place for amateurs.

Not that Hawke's Bay seems to mind on this front, it should be noted.

In the press release announcing the fine and points deduction, Hawke's Bay general manager John McGifford goes on the record to endorse the decision to dock his club of three points, and practically insists his club be punished, saying: "To lose the three points at this stage is devastating but the rules are the rules, no matter how unintentional the indiscretion was."

The other broader talking point about Hawke's Bay's costly transgression is the curiosity that it should occur at the hands of a new entity - Wanderers SC - which was arguably not part of the original purpose of the premiership.

When the league was devised in 2004, there was huge debate around the merits of various entities in terms of local club support, geography, and player strength. For the wider good of the game, applications such as from 2003 league runners-up East Auckland were overlooked because this was to be a franchise-based, invitation-only competition with strict criteria, working to meet clear national body objectives, such as improving the sport's financial viability and long-term sustainability.

Indeed, under the original ASB premiership licence agreement the long term goal of the league was to be "the premier men's competition, commercially sustainable, entertainment product that engages the interest of both players and supporters of football in New Zealand through a structured, centralised administration offering central planning and policies to ensure consistency and quality..."

Today there is admirable consistency in regulation enforcement, but real questions about the quality of promotion of the on-field product.

Meanwhile McGifford said Hawke's Bay would stoically box on.

"As a team we will regroup," he said. "The loss is not insurmountable."