Time-out for Viduka

The will he or won’t he game concerning Mark Viduka’s continuing appearance in a Socceroos strip is on again. National coach, Pim Verbeek, jetted out to Europe on Sunday and one of the players he will be catching up with will be Mark Viduka.

This once again has ignited the question does Viduka really want to continue his international career and is his time up already after not making himself available for the first two qualifying matches.

Several media commentators have jumped to burn Viduka at the stake. According to these experts, Viduka having not made himself available for national duty for the Qatar and China qualifiers has committed the mortal sin of putting himself ahead of his country and so should not be considered for future matches and selection for the World Cup.

What a load of rubbish !

There is no doubt that as national team manager the last thing you want is for players to dictate availability for matches, especially matches that mean something. However just as importantly, it is critical that Pim manages his player list to ensure the best result for Australia as a whole. Is it really in Australia’s best interests to force Viduka to a decision on his playing future earlier than later. It seems a little short-sighted to insist he makes himself available for matches against Qatar, China and Iraq when the likely outcome is that he would retire.

Viduka has not commented on his position regarding national duty for a reason. That simply is because he hasn’t made up his mind. Pim has taken the right approach here, by not forcing the issue the door remains open. Personally I would give him a free pass for this whole qualifying round (that is 6 of the 14 qualifiers we need to play). This would allow Viduka an overdue holiday in June where he can recharge the batteries. With a bit of luck, he will return hungrier than ever.

Of course this is a risk, there would be egg on Verbeek’s face if he let Viduka have the vacation in June and then failed to qualify but these are the risks that are necessary to ensure a successful qualification campaign.