so long as the players enjoy themsleves, then that is all tht matters.
the iraqi soccer team used to be better motivated - and maybe rudd could learn a thing or two
from http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2003/s847622.htm
MARK COLVIN: If there was one man Iraqis hated as much as Saddam Hussein, it was his psychopathic eldest son, Uday. As head of Iraq's Olympic Committee, Uday Hussein terrorised the country's sporting community. And one sport suffered more than any other from Uday's irrational behaviour.
In most countries, the national soccer side is treated like a group of super stars. But in interviews with PM, Iraq's leading soccer players have told of being thrown in jail, being beaten, and having their payments taken, all by Uday Hussein.
In Saddam's Iraq, a poor performance on the paddock didn't necessarily mean a mere dressing down by the coach, as Mark Willacy reports from Baghdad.
[Sound of crowd cheering]
MARK WILLACY: Soccer isn't just a sport here in Iraq, it's a national obsession, and the man who embodies the speed and skill of Iraqi soccer is Ahmed Radi.
AHMED RADI: I am three times put in jail, or prison, and two times had my hair shaved. One time, I was put in prison and shaved, with training, hard training, and heat.
MARK WILLACY: Despite being widely regarded as Iraq's greatest soccer player, Ahmed Radi did not escape Uday Hussein's punishments for a poor team performance.
[Sound of soccer players]
With more than 100 international under his belt, Laith Hussein is Iraq's top goal scorer. And like Ahmed Radi, he too has been locked up by Uday.
LAITH HUSSEIN: If the team lost, he put the team in the jail, or he cut hair, or sometime he slapped some player. That's what he did.
MARK WILLACY: Another Iraqi international, striker Husham Mohammed, remembers one incident more than any other.
"In 2001 we lost the Asian Championships in Beirut," Husham says. "So when we got back to Baghdad, Uday blamed me and two of my friends for the failure, and we were put in prison for 16 days," he says.
But not only did Uday take away their freedom when it suited him, he also took their pay. Most Iraqi internationals had 40 per cent of their earnings stripped by the psychopathic son of the President. But it was the fear of prisons and beatings which most, like superstar Ahmed Radi, remember most.
AHMED RADI: Maybe we are in the other country, we have a game or championship. When we lose this game we are always speaking about how Uday punished us when we returned to Baghdad. And sometimes we are joking about these things.
MARK WILLACY: Striker, Laith Hussein was imprisoned in 1986, 88, 89, 93, 98 and 2000. It reads a bit like a best and fairest award list. But Laith admits Udays punishments certainly acted as an incentive.
