Tim Cahill On The World Cup That Changed Everything

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1:06Discover the V-Series lineup at cadillac.com. There's that many outlets now where so many different people can talk about him. I would have picked him, I would have picked him. Even as an ex-player for England, I could never doubt what Thomas Tucci was doing. Of course he's speaking to me, I'm not even listening to him. A few minutes later I scored the first ever goal for Australian World Cup. And the celebration will show, Gus Hiddink goes to high-five me and I ducked it. So when I left that year, Everton went on to finish fourth place, I think. And you look back and think, wow, I'm finishing fourth place, I've left.

1:39Was I, like, the problem?

1:43Wayne, let's start today by you telling us exactly how you met today's guest on the show. Yeah, him. Well, I first met Tim at Belfield, Everton's old training ground, and he'd just signed for the club and I think it was a day or two and I'd left. So I remember sitting there having breakfast and talking to him and then I left, so that was it, yeah. Tim Payhill, happy memories, I'm sure. Talk us through your first encounters with Wayne. To be honest, it was the wonder kid of the club and when I'd sat and spoken to David Moyes and Bill Kenwright, one of the things I just asked them when I signed my contracts is, am I going to play?

2:24They were looking at me weird. My agent was looking, why are you asking that for? I said, well, I'm not going to come if I'm not going to play. I need to know I've got a future and I'm going to play because for me, I prefer to play down a level or a different club to get the minutes. So, you know, good squad, rock up to the training ground, meet everyone, Jimmy Martin, all the guys. And Belfield has this cultural feel of family. It's old school. And they asked me, what number do you want? So I was looking through the numbers. I'm thinking, don't take anything in the starting 11. And it was 16 and 18.

3:01So Tommy Graveson was 16 and Wayne was 18. So I was like, I'm going to sit in the middle of that. I'll pick 17. So I'm thinking to myself, yes, I meet Wayne and we have a chat. And luckily we get on and Tony Hibbert, Stubbsy, all these guys who, Duncan Ferguson, who pretty much are the emblem of the club, were telling me everything about Everton and Wayne. We were chatting. Two days later, he takes off. That must have been weird for you because you probably had an inkling that you were going. Yeah, no, I did. I think probably everyone did because it was everywhere. So when I left that year, Everton went on to finish in fourth place, I think.

3:40And you look back and think, wow, finished in fourth place? I've left. Was I the problem in the team? But they made some great signings. obviously Tim, Jag Yelker, Bainsey, which absolutely improved the club massively. So I think it was with the money which he got from me, which helped certain players. So I felt happy in a small way. I'm going to do what I promised to do before and take it away from Everton now. What was 2006 like for you in terms of the World Cup? Because you literally wrote your name, as you did many times throughout your career, but into Australian folklore, scoring the first World Cup goal.

4:19Yeah, it was crazy. 28 years not qualifying for a World Cup. A lot of us were playing in the biggest stages in the world and mixing it. And when you put that golden generation together of Viduka, Swartza, Harry Kuhl, Guerrilla, Popovich, Muskie, Morey, some of these guys, we knew that when we qualified that we could do something special. And we've got Gus Hiddink. And I'll never forget it. We were playing in Uruguay and we lost 1-0 there. I was on the bench, Harry started, and then at home, he put me on, and Harry was on the bench, and Gus was really good with playing with people's minds, playing with players' minds.

5:00On the return leg back to Uruguay, Gus had all the business class flights and planes booked out, so they had to go the long route. And funny enough, Aussies have a mentality of great sportsmanship and you know but Gus had a mindset of his aura and being clever and agile and ahead of the game so that was an advantage but to get to the 2006 World Cup Gus stuck me on the bench the first game and he knows I wasn't happy I was sitting on the bench spewing Arnie calls me up to go up and Gus is speaking to me I'm not even listening to him I'm not even listening to him and I pour some water on my head and I go on the pitch and he's, what are you going to tell me?

5:45We're losing 1-0 to Japan. You know what you've got to do, don't you? Well, at the end of the day, I'm 1-2 for Australia. I've always backed myself, especially on the biggest stages, to score. A few minutes later, I scored the first ever goal for Australia in the World Cup and it was for me, can retire the next day and it was a dream. And then a few minutes later again, I scored the second goal. we're up 2-1 against Japan and the celebration will show Gus Hiddink goes to high five me and I ducked it and and I say this with the utmost respect he was the man and now I'm a father uh I'm a grandfather as well I yeah I I'm done all my licenses and now we played against Chelsea and I gave him the biggest hug now I know what it is to be a manager and understand how to utilize the best because he challenged Dukes, he challenged Paduka, sorry, Harry, he challenged Lucas Neal.

6:41He did it for purposes that at the time I was really, even after the game, he tried to talk to me and I wouldn't talk to him. And I held that fire and that fire is probably what gave me the best moment ever in Australian soccer. I'm noticing quite a similar mentality in terms of you two, because I imagine there was moments where you didn't agree with managers, but, and you were quite single-minded in terms of Tim, you knew your ability and what you could go on and do and probably you look back on certain incidents and realize very much the same and I had a well I said some words about David Moyes when I left Everton and then it was a few years later I phoned him up and apologized because as Tim said you get older you mature and then you understand why the coaches are doing things and him and yeah I understood they apologized and I think that's part of growing up and trying to figure out why a coach has made a decision which he's made but as you get a little bit older and as Tim said, you go into coaching you recognise why he's done it and you may be thinking I shouldn't have reacted that way But do you think that fire is part of what makes you the player you both were?

7:50If you didn't have that you probably wouldn't be able to excel the way you did 100 % You can't lose it It's in your DNA You know, you take it away from us and you try and want to be a footballer and be someone you're not. It really does take away that fine line of getting a yellow card or a red card. At the end of the day, it's another lesson, isn't it? Sure. Gus might have also known that day when he left you on the bench. He will have known you as a player when he had known that would have fired you up as well. You know, it was a World Cup where I had a great season at Everton. I was playing on the weekend on a Saturday at Everton.

8:22I was flying back playing midweek in Australia on a Wednesday or Thursday and I was flying back and playing for Everton on the Sunday. And that's a 24-hour flight to get to Australia recovery. Gus kept me on my toes. He never once made me feel like I was selected, and I don't like that. Not that I should expect it, but with my numbers and with my fitness and my dedication, I always felt like training especially. I had to train at 100%. I never trained six out of ten, seven. If I didn't train at nine out of ten, it was difficult to keep up. So I realized that I couldn't relax in my career. I had sacrificed so much and so did my parents.

9:09It was sort of like just for me riding the wave and just enjoying the journey because if someone took it off me, I promise you, I don't need football now. I can be away from football. I can be with my family. And that's really, really important for after football life, for mental clarity and for understanding your why and who you are and what you want as a person. Forget football because it's a difficult career that, yeah, when your kids start playing it. We were speaking the other day about our boys. It does, you know, please. I prefer my son not to play football. Really? It's tough, isn't it?

9:52the pressure of being a professional footballer is it's tough it's intense there's a lot of things which go on behind the football which for a human being and for a young boy is very difficult so I completely understand why Tim would feel that way because it can it can damage people football can damage people with everything what goes with it and you have to be very strong mentally to be able to deal with it and get through that So I think what's important for me is if my boy wants to go and play football, I support it as much as he can. If he turned around and said, I don't want to do football, I want to do whatever else, then obviously I support that too.

10:35I guess you've got the unique perspective, both of you, though, that you have an advantage in terms of other parents. Don't you know all of those challenges already? Which, yes, I can see why it would put you off a bit, Tim. But also you can be one step ahead, maybe. We have the advantage because we grew up not with everything. They don't have the advantage. And on top of that, they have to put the name on the back of their shirt and they have to carry that. So whatever they take on as responsibility is something that I feel responsible for because any move they make, any decision they do, yeah, I've had my ups and downs.

11:15But for him, I feel like there's constant eyes on him. he feels that we have discussions and at the end of the day as long as you're a father that's all that matters as long as they know they've got somewhere to turn and um yeah always pressure but you know football's not meant for everyone and I said that to my son I've said it to a lot of people um those big moments for people that can handle it and the people that can't then you know give it to someone else going back to the world cups you obviously played in 2006 and you were pretty instrumental in the World Cup qualifiers for 2010 as well, weren't you?

11:49Yeah, I've had an amazing journey. And the reason why I think that happened is because of my consistency for Everton and also the support of the club and David Moyes. There was a time where he was asking me not to go back in a way because of my body towards the latter stage. But, yeah, when you play for your country, it means everything. It's a difference. You don't need to be paid for your country. You basically, for me, if you sing the national anthem every single time, it's sort of like, especially in a World Cup, there was a tear in my eye, you know, because that's the fire, I suppose, you get for getting that opportunity to play on the biggest stage in the world.

12:37It's been interesting hearing kind of Tim talk about some of the big players that Australia had. at that point. You kind of forget like, I mean, Mark Schwartz, you'll have played against all of those, against all of those players. Harry Kuehl, there was some, Vaduka, there were some really special players in that generation, wasn't there? Yeah, there was. And I think they went through a period of having some really top players and quite a few of them obviously playing in the Premier League. And Australia's always a country I look at firstly for I made my England debut against Australia. Didn't like the result.

13:11You weren't playing in that game, I don't think. No, I was in the stand trying to get cleared to play for Australia. I was going through a court case because I played for Samara as a kid. So I won the court case. But I was at that game. I got invited and, you know, I had a call up from Ireland and I said no because I didn't know the national anthem. It's not me, regardless whether they wanted me when I was at Millwall. And I waited for Australia. But I remember that game. I think it was 3-1. Yeah, 3-1. Emma scored, yeah. Sven changed the whole team at half-time. So I come on at half-time and our team in the second half drew 1-1.

13:48So the team in the first half lost 2-0. However many years later, he's still claiming that. What was that moment like for you? I think we spoke about it, didn't we, briefly because you and Franny Jeffers when he came on the show, what was that moment like? Yeah, no, I was 17, making my debut for England. It was such a special moment. And obviously the result weren't great, but just a proud moment. to play for me, couldn't I? Loved it, wanted more of it and then thankfully I went off to play another 119 times. Take the leash off your laptop with the processor that gives you long battery life. Work on the go.

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14:55So you already knew each other at that point? Yeah, yeah. Oh. Getting my ears mixed up. No, I think I might have been at Millwall then. Yeah, I was just about to come. So at that point, did you know anything of a Wayne Rooney? You heard whispers and noises, but you could see his ability as a player whenever you're seeing glimpses. And that year you played Ferventon as well, right? Obviously that Arsenal goal gets played on replay. So you knew the ability. It was just whether or not when he was going to get unleashed to the world properly. And that was really clever from England to bring him on.

15:34I was going to ask, with that Australian team, do you sometimes think about what it was that allowed there to be so many great Australian players at that moment in time, which probably isn't happening as much now? And what could be done in order to recreate stars like that? It's simple because all the players that played for Australia back then, I didn't come through the system. I was told I wasn't good enough. I left at 16 and went and had a trial. A lot of us left early. and it was sort of like the AIS which is the equivalent of like an academy that you have here for England. It's pathways like you know now I'm the chief sports officer of Aspire Academy.

16:15I help to write curriculums. I help to write methodologies and programs and it's really important you invest in grassroots. It's really important you have the facilities and good school programs and the end product will probably come in five to ten years. the problem with australia when you go for quick fix for example you have an a-league um that is by a license and then you get a team and then there's no you know i played first team reserves 19s 18s 17s 16s through that now that now there isn't that there's no connection the second division there's no promotion relegation so there has to be a holistic approach domestically across the country that links all the federations and things like that.

17:01So it's not a surprise to me. You get what you put back in. And unfortunately, there is some great young talent that go overseas and do well and do amazing in the O-League. It's a great league. I've played in it. But it's not the same as going and playing in a second division or first division with men. No, we're actually recording this ahead of the World Cup. The yet but how do you rate the chances this summer what's the ceiling what what's the expectation look there's 48 teams uh the world cups i played in were 32 when you break it down and look across the groups um and best place third finish you should really get through your group uh in five world cups we got through two group stages um and i i think australia regardless is in your group You know, it's one-off games.

17:52It's not the Premier League where you can lose because you've got how many games. It's one-off. You set up, low block, just wait, make a mistake, set play, honestly. And you pick the game potentially that you've got to draw to get a point and the game where you've got to win. You finish third, best place third, you're through. Then it's just a flick of the coin. Great thing about Popovich, I played with him. He's boarded Mila Yedinak, captain that I helped mentor through World Cups and Asian Cups that we've won, and they're going to be fit. Gus Hiddick made us one of the fittest teams in the competition, so they're going to be fit.

18:26There's some good skill, good youngsters. So this is sort of like the rebirth of these youngsters to take this World Cup and then the next one after that. So I feel they're going to do well, and I expect them to get through the group. I expect them potentially to get further than any Australian team, and you have to think of 48 teams, not 32. 32 there's no room for our you know four points first world cup through the group four points second world cup we miss out um four points this world cup we're through what about england then because obviously i imagine you're not living in england now but you must still have an affinity with the country you know so much about it how do you think they can do 100 um i'm excited for england and the problem is they've got too many great players what a nice problem and listening to the press conference and listening to people talk about the England squad, I suppose the selections get picked off the manager and the federation and the country's philosophy.

19:25It does. You pick Pep Guardiola, he's going to pick a different lineup. You pick David Moyes, he's going to pick a whole different lineup. But you've picked Tuchel. You already know what style of play he's going to pick. You already understand his methodology and his thinking behind football. so it's not a surprise because at the same time he has to be safe enough that he's got to get through the group which I think they will he has so much ammunition that I think they can actually you get to the semis finals which I think England can they have a chance of winning it I really like what you said when we did the the day the squad was announced and you said despite not agreeing with every call which no one's ever going to agree with every call it's so subjective you said the difference is you really have a trust in him and you trust in what he's doing and we have to trust him because of the body of work as Tim mentioned that he comes into this World Cup with Yeah listen Thomas Tuchel is a top manager and he's picked a group which he feels can win the World Cup and not everyone will agree with it but I like the fact that what he thinks can win it he's picked it he's not worried about upsetting certain players or what this person thinks, whatever.

20:37He's just picked a team and he thinks, right, I'm going away. I think the most important thing, you can already see through Tim talking, Tim's mindset, picking players with the right mindset and the right drive a lot of the time is better than picking players with the biggest talent. And I think what Thomas Tuchel has done since he's been in is try and figure out what players have got that mindset, where players are going to push other players, they're going to drive, they're going to want it more than other players. And I think that's what he's tried to figure out and he's picked the team he thinks is best to push each other.

21:13Yeah, he also said Thomas Tuchel, when he was kind of quizzed, as they always are in their Nancy squads, he was like, the best players don't always win the World Cup. It's more about, he's made it clear, it's about the team and the culture as someone that, obviously, you were one of the best players in Australia's squad, but do you understand that? And I mean, Wayne's spoken to us about it a lot, about you're away for such a long period of time. It's actually often about the character. Yeah, because it's a long time and the mentality of players, whether they can be in camp that long, whether they understand the training, the responsibilities and also the accountability.

21:46But in that group, when you look, I think that there's too much analysed about football all the time for the sake of just analysing. You know, at the end of the day, if they get through the group and he wins the next game, he's going to be the best coach ever, one of the best that he's expected. And it's always after that someone says, I told you, I told you, he'll do well. And it wouldn't bother him because you look at the state of Chelsea now with the turnover of managers. Tuchel was probably up there as one of the best managers they ever had. Chelsea fans love him still. Yeah, and that's the understanding.

22:22Fans get bored, people get bored, they want to be entertained, they're emotional. Football, at the time that we play, it's not emotional, it's business. You know, we have to try and win. We have to do the right thing for the country. And I always said it's an absolute honour to sit on the bench for Australia, even in my last World Cup. And as you get older, you realise that you don't have a right to hold that jersey just because you play in the Premier League. There could be a young kid that comes in, 17, scores a goal and takes your spot. And that's where you mature a lot. I think England are going to be in good stead.

22:58It'll be them and France in the final if it goes that way. That was my next question. I think what Tim's saying there is when you pick a squad, there's that many outlets now where so many different people can talk about him. I would have picked him. I would have picked him. When actually 99 % of them people are probably not qualified to doubt what Thomas Tuchel is doing. and even as an ex-player for England, I could never doubt what Thomas Tuchel is doing and who he's picking. So then when you've got journalists, you've got fans, you've got YouTubers all saying, oh, he should have done this. He can play off the left.

23:35He can come in inside. It's relevant to what Thomas Tuchel has done. He's picked a squad he thinks is going to win and we just have to back him and put trust in him. Do you think an England-France final, I mean, I would take that. No, but you see the players that he's picked. I think there's a lot of centre-backs in there, right? He already tells you the way he's going to set up, and he knows he's going to win games 1-0, and he knows that he's going to nick a set play, and he knows he can protect it. There's a different mindset, whereas maybe Brazil or Portugal are thinking, young, let's go, well, let's try something different.

24:09So the manager does reflect the selections and also the style, and no one will ever remember the way England play when they win the World Cup. And that's the most important thing is no one's going to go back and say, oh great football they just think about the trophy so the group usa paraguay turkey how do you rate that popovich will probably aim to for the upset and he's told them already um what he expects and there's there is no ceiling and the last game against paraguay then again it's it's just one off games having tim on wayne when he arrived at everton he was kind of like one of australia's biggest stars really in terms of like the biggest imports coming over you've been at millwall hadn't weren't you, Tim?

24:50And then coming to Everson, what did it feel like seeing Everson sign a player like that? If I'm honest, you don't know, do you? You're never sure. And obviously he was at Millwall, I think you just got the FA Cup final. Yeah, against United. That year as well. And so he was obviously doing really well, but you never know going into the Premier League. And what Tim achieved at Everson was, you know, he's an absolute legend at the football club and the goals he scored, the passion he showed, the fight he showed, the leadership, is everything which you need to play for Everton. And he's left a legacy at Everton.

25:23But when he first signed, would you have said, this is what Tim Kaley is going to achieve at Everton? You just don't know. What I was trying to get at then, Tim, was talking about you in terms of Australian football in your era. You were the superstar. But I guess it was at Everton where you grew and became that. You know, it's a long story because I was 16, parents got a loan went to England had to wait for a trial got a trial could have signed in the Premier League first division I chose the second division with uh Millwall and I just wanted to play now you think about an Australian boy my mum's from Samoa we play rugby we're fighters and we're rugby players you know some of my cousins play for the All Blacks and Samoa and the K1 fighters and all that sort of stuff and I just wanted to a chance and as soon as I got my debut I didn't look back.

26:14We got promoted, played 256 games, and every year someone was knocking at the door. I'm very loyal. We had a crack at trying for the Premier League, and this is when David Moyes and Bill Kenwright come. We lost to Birmingham for the playoff final to get to the Premier League after. Then we got to the FA Cup final, which was a big moment. Millwall made me. It made me. You play at Millwall, you play anywhere. That's my strong opinion. And then I went to Everton and I had to learn what it was to be a blue. And after my first season at Everton, yeah, I scored loads of goals. I'll never forget. The lads were saying to me, Tim, be ready.