Terry Maddaford: Now is not the time to dump Oceania's leader

Basil Scarsella must not even contemplate resigning as president of the Oceania Football Confederation.

In light of Fifa's disgraceful about-face over direct World Cup entry for the beleaguered South Pacific confederation, Scarsella this week hinted that if Oceania stakeholders don't want him, he will walk.

While not on the agenda for the next OFC executive meeting, brought forward a week to July 19, the fear remains that delegates representing the smaller nations could raise the presidency as an issue.

Elected until 2006 by a 6-5 vote, Scarsella must keep hold of the reins as the OFC attempts to work through this latest slap in the face by Fifa president Sepp Blatter.

Threatening to take the world's biggest sporting organisation to the international Court of Arbitration for Sport - as Fijian Football Association president Sahu Khan did last week - will do nothing for the fledgling confederation. No one takes Fifa to court and wins.

Soccer in the smaller South Pacific nations depend on Blatter's golden hand for their very existence. The game in this part of the world would fold quickly if Fifa withdrew the US$25million grant they distribute over a four-year period.

Stability is very much the name of the game. Only Australia and New Zealand can provide that. The president must continue to come from either of those countries if the OFC is to have any credibility in the hallowed corridors of Fifa in Zurich.

The sports governing body is hardly squeaky clean itself.

Like many such organisations, Fifa is riddled with bribery and corruption. This week, in a letter to all Oceania federations, Blatter spelt out the specific reasons why Fifa reversed last December's decision to give Oceania a place in the 32-team competition in Germany in 2006.

"Several factors have been taken into account without one being pre-dominant," the letter read. "New Zealand's weak performance at the Confederations Cup, Australia's irreverent attitude to the OFC Nations Cup final, recurrent problems in the organisation and administration of the most prominent national association [Australia] in your region ... ," Blatter wrote.

He made it clear that Fifa had done much for the region and expected Oceania to continue to modernise the confederation's structure with "unfailing commitment."

He gave no indication of what World Cup qualifying path Oceania could now expect, saying the Fifa executive committee would seek the "optimum solution" and that the OFC should discuss the issue at the July 19 meeting.

For Blatter to proffer such weak reasoning is pathetic.

Acting Soccer Australia chairman Les Avory went as far to tag the decision as "the biggest act of bastardry that sport has ever seen."

The OFC must now accept there is no right of appeal, and must look at the best possible solution.

Forget playing the fifth-placed South American team or any European nation. The Socceroos have been down that track and have come up short or even aligning with the Asian Confederation.

Asia has done little in the past for this part of the soccer-playing world.

The OFC should instead seek a playoff with the fifth-placed Asian side and the fourth-placed Concacaf (North and Central American) team, with two of those three qualifying for Germany. Asia and Concacaf are already scheduled to scrap for one of the last two places in the cup. A three-into-two scenario may well be Oceania's best option.

But only if Oceania can present a united face to Fifa. Dumping Scarsella would do irretrievable harm.

The nine island nations have their place, but the presidency/chairmanship and the seat on Fifa's all-powerful executive should be held by the countries recognised by Fifa as the confederation's power base, Australia and New Zealand.

The OFC is a cash cow which the island nations and their executive members are happy to milk, as alluded to in a story in the magazine Pacific with Island Business last year in which the allowances paid to OFC/Fifa members and other island sporting administrators were revealed.

Instead, they should take the lead of New Zealand Soccer's OFC representative, Mark Burgess, who hands his annual US$42,000 allowance back to his national association "for the good of the game."

Oceania soccer is again at the crossroads. Only some clear thinking and rational decisions will stabilise a rocking ship.