John Boultbee shares his middle name with the Australian Soccer coach Frank Farina and hopefully it was more than this lone credential which encouraged Soccer supremo, John O’Neill to turn to a former coxen to guide the highest level national teams in the round ball game. John took up his appointment last Wednesday just two days before the Socceroos met Turkey at Aussie Stadiium going down 3-1. In the following game John’s influence seemd to be having immdediate effect as Australia played very strongly and were unlucky to lose from a set piece free kick after deceptive acting from one of the Turkish forwards.
Of course John’s extensive knowledge of high performance achievements through his work at the AIS and with Rowing Australia means that soccer at the top level in Australia can look forward to a more thoughtful and strategically planned approach to achieving their best performance.
Boultbee is shown here at the 2003 Gold Cup with Eric Carter.