DAILY TELEGRAPH
By John Taylor
May 04, 2008 12:00am
A-LEAGUE champions Newcastle Jets are one club who won't be offering $150,000 a year to their best under-23 player under marquee status.
In a bid to stop the hottest young talent leaving the country, Football Federation Australia will allow clubs to have a maximum $150,000 salary for one under-23 player exempt from the league's $1.9 million salary cap.
Olyrooos Nathan Burns, Mark Bridge, Bruce Djite and Stuart Musialik have all indicated a desire to play in foreign leagues after the Beijing Olympics.
FFA chief Ben Buckley believes it is a very important initiative taken by the federation.
"It's one we consulted the clubs on and the Players' Association, that in partnership with them we could use this mechanism to try to retain players who may be enticed to go overseas on slightly larger financial incentives,'' Buckley said.
"If the clubs use it wisely, we think it has the real ability to retain some of the players who can do with an additional one, two or three years in the A-League before they may want to go overseas.''
However, Jets chief John Tsatsimas said his club did not agree.
"It runs the risk of alienating players, which leads to disharmony,'' Tsatsimas said.
"We don't have Bridge or Musialik any more but we've still got Tarek Elrich, Adam D'Apuzzo and James Holland (Olyroos).
"I just think if the player is good enough and wants to go, you are not going to stop him.''
Newcastle also don't use the $450,000 allowed for additional service agreements.
"That's the owner (Con Constantine's) decision. It all leads to inflating costs, and where does it end?'' Tsatsimas said.
Opening-round draw (August 15-17): Newcastle v Central Coast (Friday), Sydney FC v Melbourne (Saturday), Wellington v Queensland, Adelaide v Perth (Sunday)
Article Source: http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,23641338-5006068,00.html
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