Review: Sheilas, wogs & poofters

Submitted for publication to Green Left Weekly

A late header from lanky striker Josh Kennedy ensured Australia beat Iraq 1-0 in their final qualifier match for the 2014 World Cup, guaranteeing the Socceroos a ticket to Brazil.

 
Some 80,532 supporters filled a sold-out ANZ Stadium, the largest crowd for the national men's team in soccer (football to most of the world) since the 2005 qualifying match against Uruguay in the same venue.

 
Despite being their team being at bottom of the table, out of contention for 2014, and wracked by disagreements between players and their federation, about 5000 Iraqi fans overflowed the away bays, at times outshining the Australian fans.

 
A protest group calling for Socceroo fans to chant “peace for Iraq”, in recognition of Australia's role in the devastating war on the Middle East nation gained national media attention, but received no official mention on the night.

The Socceroos third straight qualification for the World Cup is a world of change from a decade earlier, when Johnny Warren's account of the game and his experiences in it ― Sheilas, Wogs and Poofters ― was first released.

Warren was vice-captain of the first Australian team to qualify for the World Cup, in West Germany in 1974. However, it is as much for his media work and advocacy for the game in Australia, during the 30 years of struggles and setbacks that followed, that he is remembered as “Captain Socceroo”.

Sheilas, Wogs and Poofters gives a harrowing account of the mistakes and misfortune that plagued the Socceroos and football in Australia through these long years.

Warren didn't live to see Australia return to Germany and the world stage in 2006. After being diagnosed with lung cancer, Warren passed away on November 6, 2004. In tribute, the SBS broadcast of the 2006 World Cup featured Warren's defiant phrase, “I Told You So”, in the backdrop.

 
The book features Warren's insider view of Australian football culture from the 1950s to today. Warren's own career features heavily, starting in his home suburb of Botany in Sydney's east, before moving to Canterbury-Marrickville in 1959.

The highlight of Warren's career was his 12 years at St George Budapest, a club formed by Hungarian migrants after World War II. The club was the core of the Socceroos in 1974, with Warren one of 10 St George players named in the squad.

His success at St George provides a fascinating look at the formative years of modern football in Australia. As a player, captain, coach and media figure, Warren constantly struggled to broaden the appeal of the game beyond the migrant clubs and dislodge common prejudices against the game.

These prejudices are referenced in the title ― “Sheilas, Wogs and Poofters”. Warren explained the references to sexism, racism and homophobia: “If it does offend in 21st century Australia then you can imagine what it was like fifty years ago. 'Sheilas', 'wogs' and 'poofters' were considered the second class citizens of the day, and if you played soccer you were considered one of them.”

Warren said such prejudices were responsible for sporting discrimination into the 21st century, with mainstream media and institutions far more willing to promote other football codes.

 
It is an attitude epitomised by the racist comments of Kevin Sheedy, coach of the AFL's Greater Western Sydney Giants. Sheedy tried to explain the poor following for the AFL expansion club on May 12 by complaining that, unlike the A-League's successful first-year team, the Western Sydney Wanderers, the Giants didn't have “the immigration department” acting as “a recruiting officer”.

But the widespread outrage at Sheedy's comments reflects that these prejudices have weakened. So too does the fact that 80,000 people braved pouring rain at Olympic Park for the June qualifier match.

 
The last season of the A-League, Australia's top level of football, drew record levels of attendance and television ratings.

There are issues with the prose of Sheilas, Wogs and Poofters, but the book remains a great read for the honest insider stories of the game's difficult history in Australia.

 
As fans of the world game look forward to Brazil 2014, Warren's book deserves to be re-read. Chapter 16, for instance, deals with Warren's experiences in Latin America and the footballing relationship between Australia and Brazil.

 
In light of the huge protests that erupted in Brazil, sparked by the government's attacks on the poor ahead of the next year's Cup, the analysis of Brazil's football culture helps towards understanding the contradictions of corporatised sport.

Sheilas, Wogs & Poofters: An Incomplete Biography of Johnny Warren & Soccer in Australia

Johnny Warren with Andy Harper & Josh Whittington

Random House Australia, 2002

Tonight I'm singing for the Socceroos

Tonight I'm singing for the Socceroos. Although I won't be leaving my club colours at the door, I'll be cheering, singing and waving my flag for the socceroos - even players like Milligan and Thompson.

Why? Not for jingoistic fervour or in defence of Australian nationalism. Cheering to get one up over our opponents from Iraq, and demonising them to do so, is incompatible with my values and those of the world game. Indeed, those using the opportunity to apologise for Australia's participation in the 2003 Iraq War should be commended.

Those who seek to steer the beautiful game towards close-minded nationalism, and who revel in the opportunities presented by our dominance in other sports to mock the global south or the "whinging poms", are often the very same voices who alternate between belittling and demonising the game and its supporters in its domestic incarnation.

It's because the game brings out the best in our society that I'll be singing for the Socceroos. The history of 'soccer' in this country is as much a history of the struggle against racism and towards multiculturalist values as it is of sporting contests. This spirit is encapsulated by SBS's The World Game - never demonising our opponents, but always respecting them as worthy adversaries.

To sing for the Socceroos is to sing for legends like Johnny Warren, both a legendary player and figure who pushed us to accept new migrants of the 20th century. It's to prove him right, that he told us so.

It's to sing for Charlie Perkins, footballer and legendary Aboriginal activist who Warren worked with as coach of Canberra. Perkins was first accepted as fully human and deserving of rights by migrant football clubs; my local National Premier League club, Sydney Olympic, paid his way through his studies at the University of Sydney, where he participated in the Freedom Rides.

It's to sing for Kyah Simon, captain of Sydney FC's victorious W-league team, and the first indigenous Australian to score in a world cup (let's hope Jade North joins her this time round!) - and to sing for the Matildas and their victory over the Ferns last week, and the developing level of women's football in Australia.

And it's to sing for the latest generation of stars like Lucas Neill, who refused to take even a minute answering questions for Fox Sports last Thursday in order to have more time to speak to the thousands of fans who turned up to an open training session at Kogarah. This may be his last time round at the World Cup, but I'm sure his role in the game, and our national discourse, is far from over.

Every bit of success for the Socceroos helps boost the beautiful game's place in Australia, helps dispel the bigoted thinking of the past about it, and helps to cement our place in the football world.

Football and racism

An interesting anecdote on how the world game has been involved in breaking down racism from the introduction to Johnny Warren's book "Sheilas, wogs & poofters":

The wog clubs didn't inflict the discrimination which was their struggle. For them football was always the currency. It didn't matter to them what someone looked like. It only mattered that they could play football. The late Charlie Perkins told the story that the Greek and Croatian clubs in Adelaide, and later the Pan Hellenic club in Sydney, were the first Australians to recognise him as a person to be treated equally. Charlie's football career commenced before the 1967 referendum moved to include Aborigines as part of the 'official' population of Australia. The axiom of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' rand true and as such, both Charlie Perkins and non-English speaking migrants shared a bond through the common enemy of racism. Charlie became hugely popular in the migrant football communities primarily because he was a good footballer. To be finally accepted as an equal was a power social panacea for Dr Perkins.

It's a phenomenal book (the title speaks to mainstream Australian attitudes towards "soccer" at the time of Warren's coming of age in the 1950s) and well worth a read for anyone interested in the evolution of the round ball game in Australia, as well as an examination of migration & racism.