Belgium has shown by its revival how to rebuild football from the bottom-up, focussing on youth structures - and this should help Australia
Thirty years ago Belgian football was strong. They had a good quality domestic league, they had finished runners-up in the 1980 European championships and 4th in the 1986 World Cup.
But they started to fall apart after the 1990 World Cup – when they were victims of a pretty spectacular David Platt goal in the Round of 16 – and endured an embarrassing first round exit in the 2000 European Championships, which they co-hosted with the Netherlands.
By 2001, they had reached their rock-bottom and were ranked 71st in FIFA rankings.
What they did was to put in motion a 10-year plan to get back to the top that involved not just all Belgian clubs but football throughout the school system.
They didn’t qualify for the 2008 European Championships or for the 2010 World Cup. But they kept plugging away building talent and getting success in their youth teams reaching the U-17 World Cup for the first time in 2007. The playing squad included Eden Hazard and Christian Benteke.
The average age of the Red Devils in Brazil was 25.7. When Belgian national team players are asked about the revival in Belgian football they make the point that they have played together from a youth level.
The person responsible for youth development at the Belgian FA from 2002 to 2013 was Eric Abrams – the man appointed yesterday to be Australia’s new National Technical
Director. Abrams role will focus on elite pathway and youth development structures in line with the national curriculm put in place by his predecessor, Han Berger.
After 11 years heading up Belgium’s youth development, Abrams has spent the past twelve months in Saudi Arabia where his U-15 team won the coveted King’s Cup.
By the way, the title reminds us of this. Still funny after all these years.