Edward Brothers

[retro royal]

Alistair Edwards could not be more proud of sons Ryan and Cameron, who have signed professional deals with English Championship club Reading.

But the former Socceroos striker, who is now Australia's assistant technical director, is not entirely comfortable with the environment that led to his sons going overseas.

Ryan, 17, has a four-year deal, and Cameron, 19, will have a year, at least, to make an impression.

Edwards, whose job with Football Federation Australia is to help improve playing standards, is confident his boys can make it.

His only disappointment is that the Australian youth internationals did not get a chance to kick-off their professional careers in the A-League. Both played for Perth Glory's youth team and Cameron shared the best player award with Dean Evans last season.

"We want to encourage our players to stay in the country," said Edwards, who was 17 when he left Perth in 1985 to start a career that was rewarded with international caps. "My advice to them, and to all players, is to try and stay here in the A-League first and then if they got the opportunity to go overseas later, that's when they should look at it.

"It's heartbreaking, in a way.

"But it makes my resolve stronger. We need to create more opportunities for our players to be able to stay in Australia."

The 10-team A-League does not cater for the number of players being produced in Australia.

After being overlooked in Australia, the Edwards brothers reached a positive outcome just two weeks into a trial at Reading in March.

"Our first game was against Fulham reserves and they had quite a lot of first-team players - Bobby Zamora, Zoltan Gera, (Philippe) Senderos, (Diomansy) Kamara, (Jonathan) Greening, (Simon) Davies," Cameron said. "It was a spin out."

Ryan said his dad's guidance had already been invaluable and would continue to be so, albeit from afar.

"Dad is definitely a role model. We want to follow in his footsteps ... and go beyond it," he said.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/sport/ ... ith-pride/

[Rex]

The 10-team A-League does not cater for the number of players being produced in Australia.

Possibly something to do with it

[Hampshire Royal]

The biggest problem with Australian football (or 'Soccer') is that the most popular sport in Oz is Thuggery with Rules (or Aussie Rules Football). When I was in Perth I tried on a number of occasions to get tickets for Aussie Rules games to try and see what all the fuss was about - absolutely impossible!! I went to see Perth Glory play 'soccer' simply by turning up on the day (they were rubbish). The TV is saturated with coverage of Aussie Rules during the season and 'soccer' barely gets a mention. The direction a young athletic boy takes is therefore not going to be 'soccer', unlike most of Europe, Africa and South America.

[floyd__streete]

I thought this thread was going to be about two spikey haired tw@ts from Ireland.

If these two make half the impact at RFC that Oliver Bozanic did.....

[ZacNaloen]

From what I understand Bozanic was shaping up just fine until he started kissing girls and got Glandular fever

[floyd__streete]

"We want to encourage our players to stay in the country," said Edwards, who was 17 when he left Perth in 1985 to start a career that was rewarded with international caps. "My advice to them, and to all players, is to try and stay here in the A-League first and then if they got the opportunity to go overseas later, that's when they should look at it.

"It's heartbreaking, in a way.

Why would they want to stay in a country with a weak league in a country where 'soccer' must be - at best - the 5th favourite sport. If they have the talent they will want out as soon as they can develop their skills abroad.

Typical aussie self-importance.

[brendywendy]

id rather be there than here too

[Barry the bird boggler]

Hope his sons do better than Alistair. 1 app for Brighton during a loan spell and 4 for Millwall in the early to mid 90s. Was on the books of Rangers in the late 80s but never made their first team. Most of the rest of his career was in SE Asia in Singapore and Oz.

[The Rouge]

4 year contract for the younger one is unprecedented for RFC isnt it?
They must think he is a real player.

[brendywendy]

i for one welcome Cedward and Redward to the club

[Pseud O'Nym]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

[leon]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

he's been sold to a circus

[Pseud O'Nym]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

he's been sold to a circus

Be just typical of this club if he makes it all the way to the Cirque du Soleil. Hope we have a sell on clause in his contract.

[leon]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

he's been sold to a circus

Be just typical of this club if he makes it all the way to the Cirque du Soleil. Hope we have a sell on clause in his contract.

[Wimb]

"We want to encourage our players to stay in the country," said Edwards, who was 17 when he left Perth in 1985 to start a career that was rewarded with international caps. "My advice to them, and to all players, is to try and stay here in the A-League first and then if they got the opportunity to go overseas later, that's when they should look at it.

"It's heartbreaking, in a way.

Why would they want to stay in a country with a weak league in a country where 'soccer' must be - at best - the 5th favourite sport. If they have the talent they will want out as soon as they can develop their skills abroad.

Typical aussie self-importance.

But then the A-League will never develop if the best young talent continue to leave the country. If that's the case the best players won't be in the A-League and therefore people won't watch it, it won't grow so the talent leaves for Europe.

I don't see it as self importance, more a desire to grow the domestic game, something I'm sure we'd all be trying to do if our best talent was buggering off abroad.

[Plymouth_Royal]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

Don't know but he's awful. He's got a lot of pace and his finishing is average but he lacks intelligence and his touch is worse than Antonio's. My mate at Brentford said he didn't rate him when he was on loan there either. Can't see him staying long and think he'll be league 2 standard at best.

[West_Reading]

Just hijacking this thread as I have a question that doesn't really merit one of its own.

Does anyone know how Bignall stands with the club? He's disappeared from the team profiles page of the OS but I've seen no mention of his going or staying.

If you're looking for him then I saw him jogging in Southcote the other day. At least he's trying to remain fit.

[Far from the royal crowds]

The reason players have to leave Australia to play professional football is that each of the 10 teams can only have a maximum of 25 players...That's really not a lot of space for players considering the population of Australia. Combined with the salary cap, there's just no incentive to stay in Australia. I earn more than some of the A-league players!

[dogzbollox]

I thought this thread was going to be about two spikey haired tw@ts from Ireland.

If these two make half the impact at RFC that Oliver Bozanic did.....

[Y21_Royal]

First sight of these two today.

Cameron looks very good on the ball. Very left footed but controlled the centre of midfield second half. He has the air of a very good talent, similar to Obita.

Ryan looked lively. Swapped wings and looked more effective on the right. Ran a lot, looked pacy but didn't really do much with the ball when he had it. Promising but it was his younger brother that really impressed for me