KEY POINTS:
Mohammed Bin Hammam's suggestion that the Wellington Phoenix should be chopped from the Hyundai A-League smacks of sour grapes.
The president of the Asian Football Confederation obviously fears that the threat posed by New Zealand to Asian teams in World Cup qualifying is very real.
Kicking them out
of the Australian league would hurt our national side and deprive the All Whites at the Phoenix of a decent standard of club football. But, we must ask, why has Bin Hammam stuck his nose into this trough? This is an Australian competition, of which the Phoenix are an integral part.
They are playing there with Fifa's blessing under a dispensation which runs until 2011. Under that agreement, the Wellington-based franchise can win the A-League but not the right to play in the Asian Champions League.
That is all Bin Hammam should concern himself with.
Football Federation Australia - who, not the AFC, own the league - have made it clear they want the Phoenix (or a team from New Zealand) in their competition.
They, like other Australian national sporting bodies, welcome the exposure New Zealand teams bring.
The NRL, the ANZ Netball competition, the Australian National Basketball League and the A-League all receive huge television coverage on this side of the Tasman. New Zealand is, they all agree, a huge market for their sports and sponsors.
In his outburst - part of an interview of Australian television channel SBS - Bin Hammam said one of the key reasons Australia was denied extra places in next season's expanded ACL (up to 32 teams) was the lack of promotion-relegation into the A-League.
So what? Where are these clubs who he wants to chase promotion going to come from? The league is set to expand by two teams next season and another two the season after. Surely that should satisfy him.
Selectively cutting teams out as is apparently his want will bring numbers down - hardly his stated objective of a bigger and, one presumes, better competition.
Maybe his sights are set higher. With Australia already firmly on course to claim one of Asia's four direct entry spots into the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, maybe the Socceroos are next on his hit list.
As a member of Fifa's powerful executive committee, Bin Hammam holds plenty of sway. But the man from Qatar is obviously confused.
After all, he is deputy chairman of Fifa's committee for Fair Play and Social Responsibility. Really.
