Brisbane Roar coach Frank Farina believes Football Federation Australia are undervaluing local coaches.
The former Socceroo boss is worried that the country's leading officials are too caught up in the Dutch coaching experiment and have forgotten about homegrown tacticians to lead the national team.
"Local coaches have always been undervalued and underpaid, but you look at the wages the FFA is now forking out, and it's never been so blatant," he said.
"This is not about sour grapes. I've had my time, and I've got no regrets. But it's about time we had some perspective. You think of what people like 'Rocky' [O'Connor], Ron Smith and Ray Junna have done at the AIS, for instance. You look at what they were paid, and it's a scandal. Between them, these guys have basically produced the bulk of the national team for the last 15 years and they were paid peanuts for doing that.
"Now the next generation is going to be produced by coaches who will be getting, what, 10 times what the previous guys were getting. Will the players be 10 times better? I doubt it. I think we have done a pretty good job up until now of producing our own talent, and the results prove that. Don't get me wrong, I'm as happy as anyone we've qualified for the World Cup. But the truth is we were doing pretty well against Asian teams before we moved into Asia. That's the facts. "To me, the FFA needs to respect local coaches a lot more, and value them more. There hasn't been enough recognition. It's all very well getting in a heap of Dutch coaches but are they all going to hang around after the World Cup? What happens when the fascination wears off? Where's the succession planning? Will local coaches step back into these positions, and will they be paid as much?
"When I was national coach, I argued for the introduction of a minimum wage for local coaches but I got nowhere. In Australia, we've devalued our own [coaching] profession for too long. Things have got to change, and that starts from the top. We've got some great coaches in this country, we just don't acknowledge it enough. The message needs to come from the FFA."
