FA counting on bold new management structure to help revive domestic game

Most of the time, when a sporting organisation appoints a new chief executive, there are two seats at the press conference.

That’s the standard set-up: one for the appointee and one for the appointer, usually the chair of the board.

On Thursday, as Football Australia unveiled Martin Kugeler as their new chief executive, there were three seats: one for FA chairman Anter Isaac, one for Kugeler and one for Heather Garriock, his new right-hand woman.

This is not the standard set-up. It may yet work brilliantly. It may not.

The position that was previously held by James Johnson for 5½ years appears to have been split into two, with Kugeler and Garriock – who has been interim CEO for the past eight months – each given a remit that matches their area of expertise.

Kugeler has the job title, with the former Stan boss emerging as the surprise choice from the long-running global search led by Egon Zehnder. Though he has never worked in football before, he is a “lifelong supporter and sufferer” of German yo-yo club Hamburger SV, which means he should be well suited to the routine suffering of being involved with Australian football.

Stan’s move into football streaming occurred during his tenure, which ended last year amid a structural shake-up of Nine Entertainment Co., the owner of Stan and this masthead.

His knowledge of the media and broadcasters is a pointer to FA’s strategy, and where the opportunities lay ahead for a game that seemingly can never get out of its own way. FA’s package of national team rights will be up for grabs again in a couple of years’ time – about the same time that the A-League(s) will be, and the English Premier League, too.

The quickest way to get the domestic game out of its funk is to put it on the same platform as the other stuff – and the best way to do that is to somehow package all those rights together so that any company that wants one will have to take all. That’s where Kugeler’s acumen could come in handy, though he was eager to point out he has many other strings to his bow, having worked as a strategy consultant in a range of industries in Australia and abroad, and also held senior finance and strategy leadership roles with global media company Bertelsmann.

The A-Leagues might not strictly be his responsibility in the post-unbundling era, but they are definitely his problem now.

“I’m not sure if everyone shares my view, but the quality of the players is exciting,” Kugeler said. “But it hasn’t translated in the following – either attendance in the stadium or also viewership on TV – that the potential is. There are so many different reasons.”

Garriock, meanwhile, will serve as deputy CEO – and as FA’s inaugural executive director of football, a staggeringly wide-ranging role in which she will oversee both senior national teams, the junior ones and the coaches in charge of them, competitions, development, technical direction and identity, participation and related international affairs.

It is the first time, Isaac said, that a single person has had “end-to-end responsibility of football” in Australia.

“There’s no obstacle that is insurmountable to Heather,” Isaac said.

Long thought to be a shoo-in for the CEO job, Garriock certainly seems to be being groomed to be the next one. An argument could be mounted that she might actually have more on her plate than Kugeler, but she will have a head of both men’s and women’s football working under her, among others.

“If I can be honest, I actually haven’t been able to, as interim CEO, focus on the strategic direction of football and be able to work with our head of national teams and to bring football together within the organisation,” she said.

“That’s what I observed as interim CEO that we were lacking, and that’s why I am so excited that there is someone of Martin’s calibre to come in and work as the leader of the organisation, but also for me to be able to report to somebody like that.”

Kugeler and Garriock are said to have already formed a healthy rapport, a sort of yin and yang dynamic. During the press conference, they both expressed how much they are looking forward to working with each other – that won’t happen until Kugeler actually starts work on February 16 – and how symbiotic the relationship is between the commercial and technical aspects of FA’s business.

“It has to go hand in hand,” Kugeler said.

“Because without football excellence, without success of the national teams, without the love that people feel connected to the teams ... the commercial success builds on that, right? So it does not start with commercial, it’s jointly football and commercial side.”

Few will care about the division of powers, job titles, or how we got here, as long as they are both effective.