Episode 9 - Religion and Australian soccer; 'Playing for Australia' review

Download and listen to episode 9 here.

As Ian was staying in Hervey Bay in Queensland over the previous week, he decided to have a look at the history of soccer in Hervey Bay and the surrounding region. Digging deeper into the story of soccer in the town of Howard, the point is reiterated that the game's fortune's, especially in rural and regional Australia, are closely tied to the fortunes (and existence or otherwise) of certain industries. That expands into a discussion on analogous comparisons with migration, and then with other sports and migration, and Ian's heroics in New Zealand soccer... and the eventually back to discussing the relevance of certain kinds of mining to soccer, and not others.

We then move on to discussing the poor historical research of the new Macarthur A-League team, which claimed that football was first played in the region in 1947.

Then 100 Years Ago Today, with apologies to the Spanish flu infected week before. Religion is the theme of the week - Rechabites, Catholics, Protestants, church leagues, among others - including references to the sections on religion in Phil Mosely's Soccer in New South Wales 1880-1980. Paul asks the question, why do some religious groups seem to favour soccer more than other religious groups? Have soccer historians focused too much on class, migration, and occupation at the expense of religious affiliation, when looking at historical sporting preference in Australia?

We then move on to soccer resuming in Tasmania after the war, and noting the death JJB Honeysett, a key personality in Tasmanian soccer; and finally to Melbourne, where soccer is struggling to reconvene, with many of its players still absent,

After that we move on Paul providing a review of Trevor Thompson's Playing for Australia: The First Socceroos, Asia and World Football. Paul was impressed! With caveats! The discussion covers:

• Thompson's previous work, One Fantastic Goal, and the environment in which that was published
• The era the book covers, which is mostly the period between the war.
• The overwhelming strength of New South Wales soccer compared to every other state - with the exception of Queensland - and the tension that caused when it came to national team selection, especially when it came to picking teams during tours which spanned areas outside New South Wales.
• The club vs national team, club vs federation, and amateur vs professional tensions, and the centrality of private entrepreneurs to success of tours by overseas sides.
• The constant pining for England, and near permanent disappointment caused by a persistent Australian colonial lackey mentality.
• The lack of meaningful competition offered by New Zealand.
• The tours through South-East Asia by Australian national teams. 
• The strength of the book lying in its eye for particular details and anecdotes, such as the attempt to establish haka like war-cries.
• The chief weakness of the book being a lack of referencing.