The Barcelona legend, the billionaire politician and the Indonesian plot to usurp the Socceroos

Football is often described as a “sleeping giant” within Australia. But in a global context, the real sleeping giant is just to our north – and it’s also the next obstacle between the Socceroos and the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

Indonesia is the world’s fourth-most populous country, and the majority of the 282 million people there are mad about the game. It is a core part of their national identity. The problem is that their passion has never been matched by their prowess.

Football is Indonesia’s national sport, but their passion has never matched their competency.Credit: Getty Images

Not since France 1938, when they competed as the Dutch East Indies, has Indonesia qualified for the World Cup. Their federation has historically been riven by corruption. Their domestic league has lurched from one crisis to the next. And the number of Indonesians who have played for top European clubs can be counted on one hand, with fingers to spare.

Players with Indonesian heritage, though? There’s Robin van Persie, Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Nigel de Jong, John Heitinga, Roy Makaay, and plenty more. Belatedly, the country is tapping into this rich pipeline of talent – most of it coming from the Netherlands, home to the second-biggest Indonesian diaspora in the world.

Of the 27 players named in Indonesia’s squad for the March international window, which begins on Thursday night with a huge World Cup qualifier against the Socceroos at Allianz Stadium, 16 have mixed heritage.

Gone are the days when Team Garuda was picked from the local competition. The side they roll out in Sydney could feature players from clubs like Wolverhampton Wanderers, Swansea City, FC Utrecht, FC Twente, Venezia, Palermo and FC Copenhagen.

Erick Thohir and FIFA president Gianni Infantino.Credit: Getty Images

To be fair, naturalisation is the same trick pulled by former coach Graham Arnold to ‘recruit’ Harry Souttar, Martin Boyle and Jason Cummings – all Scots with Australian heritage – and, before him, by Ange Postecoglou with Greek-born striker Apostolos Giannou.

Indonesia’s naturalisation project has been underway for some years but accelerated dramatically in 2023, when Erick Thohir, the billionaire businessman and government minister, became president of the Indonesian football association (Persatuan Sepakbola Seluruh Indonesia, or PSSI).

Best known to football fans as the former owner of Inter Milan, DC United and an ex-investor in the Philadelphia 76ers, Thohir is reportedly worth $2.6 billion. In 2019, he ran Indonesian President Joko Widodo’s successful re-election campaign, and in return landed the ministerial portfolio of state-owned enterprises – putting him in effective control of a huge chunk of the country’s economy. Some predict he will one day make a tilt for the presidency himself.

“This is not a victory,” said Thohir when he was appointed head of the PSSI, armed with a mandate to transform Indonesia’s football landscape and end their status as international underachievers. “Victory will only come when our national team wins a championship.”

Indonesia’s captain Jay Idzes is from the Netherlands, and is also skipper of Serie A side Venezia.Credit: Getty Images

Robbie Gaspar, an Australian ex-footballer who played in the old National Soccer League and later for four clubs in Indonesia, is head of the Indonesia Institute, a think tank aiming to improve relations between the two countries, including through the sport.

Thohir, Gaspar said, is unashamedly reaching for the stars – and is taking a shortcut by importing players of Indonesian heritage in the hope that achieving World Cup qualification will spark a grassroots revolution and attract significant investment into the game.

“They want to be big players in football, and qualifying for the World Cup is another step towards that goal of being not just an Asian power, but a world football power,” Gaspar said. “Erick dreams big. That’s his goal, to take Indonesia to a World Cup – and he’s doing whatever he can to make sure they can achieve that dream.”

As the profile of Team Garuda has changed dramatically over the past few years due to the inclusion of more foreign-born players, the PSSI decided that the coach had to change, too.

Patrick Kluivert was appointed Indonesia head coach in January.Credit: Getty Images

Two months ago, Thohir parted ways with Shin Tae-Yong – the South Korean manager who improved the team’s FIFA ranking by almost 50 places and masterminded their best-ever Asian Cup finish last year – and replaced him with Patrick Kluivert, a Barcelona legend as a player but with little experience or success as a head coach.

In so doing, Indonesia were trading one ex-Brisbane Roar assistant coach for another: Shin worked at the A-League club under Miron Bleiberg between 2005 and 2008, back when it was known as Queensland Roar, while Kluivert spent two weeks in 2010 by Postecoglou’s side after signing an ambassadorial deal with the club, brokered by one of the Roar’s then-part owners. (Brisbane was later taken over by the Bakrie Group, an Indonesian conglomerate.)

Though there were reports of friction between Thohir and Shin, the official rationale for the change was that because there were so many Dutch-born players in the squad, they would respond better to a Dutch coach, in both a tactical and cultural sense. That remains to be seen; the clash with the Socceroos will be Kluivert’s first in the job. He has brought in another famous ex-Barcelona name in Jordi Cruyff, the son of the late Johan, as assistant coach.

But there are concerns that by selecting too many naturalised players, Indonesia could be at risk of trading away the thing that truly drives international football: patriotism.

Indonesia held Australia to a 0-0 draw in their last meeting.Credit: Getty Images

“There are definitely downsides,” said Sergio van Dijk, the former A-League striker of Dutch-Indonesian descent, in an interview with The Asian Game.

“For the long term, I think this could be an issue. Because first of all, the local players could feel demotivated at this moment, not having a chance to make it or having a very difficult chance to make it into the national team. But also, if you look further than that, the future of Indonesia, how is that going to work? I mean, is it still a little boy or girl’s dream to become a national team player when there are so many naturalised players playing at this moment?”

That’s a question for tomorrow. Today, the Socceroos are trying to figure out what to make of a team that not only frustrated them to a 0-0 draw in their last meeting in Jakarta, but has potentially strengthened since then, and also has a new coach to boot.

Coach Tony Popovic has done what he can, researching Kluivert’s tactics in his few previous senior roles at Turkish club Adana Demirspor and the Curaçao national team to understand how he might set his team up.

Players, meanwhile, are bracing for anything.

“They’re a team that’s obviously been evolving constantly throughout this qualification process,” said midfielder Jackson Irvine.

“They’ve got players playing at a very good level as well. They’re capable of playing in a lot of different ways. I’ve watched a couple of their games. [They] can be quite chaotic, but also they’ve shown against us that they can defend and see out a game as well.

“We’re definitely expecting a really tough game, but for us to be at home ... is perfect for us, and a chance for us to really put our first foot forward and take the game to them.”