Soccer: Yes, the time is ripe for Fallon

By TERRY MADDAFORD

Kevin Fallon is not one of those people who easily wins friends and influences people.

But he can coach football teams.

And now is the time for the Football Kingz to swallow some pride and go, cap in hand, to get some help.

Lurching, seemingly, from crisis to crisis, the club must take stock. Get some damage control in place.

Even those close to the game who find Fallon "hard work" acknowledge that he is one who can turn things around. Fallon's no-nonsense, gruff but technical/tactical appreciation of the game he loves with a passion would give the Kingz players the direction they are surely crying out for.

When applications for the football manager were called at the end of last season, it was common knowledge that Chris Turner, now the club's chief executive/general manager, had his hand up.

His preferred running mate as team coach? Kevin Fallon.

Yet Fallon did not get to first base when the selection committee, headed by John Hart, vetted the not-inconsiderable list.

Unlike Mike Petersen, Fallon knows New Zealand soccer.

In the first of two spells on the international stage he, as John Adshead's assistant, took the All Whites to the 1982 World Cup finals.

Later, he was called in as a replacement when Wynton Rufer was no longer required as coach of the under-17 team for the 1999 world championships. In steering the youngsters to victory over Poland, Fallon won plenty of plaudits. Again he had shown he could handle the pressure of the big-time.

It is ironic that these days, two of the code's biggest names of the past couple of decades, Fallon and former All Whites striker Fred de Jong, are found behind the microphone commenting for radio and television respectively.

Both know their stuff.

Thankfully they don't hold back and are honest enough, unlike some others, to call it as they see it.

That positive speak must now be translated into on-field improvement. There are questions of player selection and other issues begging for answers. But time is short, memories long.

The Kingz fans deserve better. Having someone like Fallon, and Adshead if he could be lured back from his job in Oman, to steer the sinking ship would be the first step in the right direction.