Carl Veart addressed his future with Adelaide United once more as the Reds head coach insisted the Isuzu UTE A-League club will continue to invest in their youth “pathway” while he is in charge.
Veart, who has been at the helm since 2020, addressed the reports pre-game and the 54-year-old did so again after Saturday’s dramatic 3-2 loss to rivals Sydney FC and that the slumping Reds drop out of the top six.
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Without a win in seven matches amid a three-game losing streak, Adelaide are now seventh and adrift of sixth-placed Sydney on goal difference after 22 games.
Asked if he needed to qualify for the Finals Series to keep his job, Veart replied: “I don’t know about that.
“I’ve been very clear with the club, what I want to achieve as a coach. I will always fight that pathway for the young players.
“Yes I could’ve been a bit more demanding of the club to give us a bit more resources to get a bit more players in. But I’d rather to give that opportunity to a younger player than bring someone else in who is not going to help us win things.”
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In his pre-game press conference, Veart said he had no “KPIs” during his time as Adelaide head coach.
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Pressed on those comments after the Reds succumbed to the Sky Blues in stoppage time and if he had directives from the club in terms of selling players or winning silverware, Veart responded: “I always want to win. That’s no secret.
“I’s no secret that since I’ve been there, we made a huge change in making sure we provide that pathway not just for young South Australian players but good young players. We’ve stuck to that and we will stick to that while I’m here.
“It’s something that’s imperative that we as a club that we make sure we stand behind. We’ve had a lot of success over the last few years with playing our young players and giving them the opportunity to go on to some pretty big clubs overseas. The club’s done quite well financially out of that as well.
“At the end of the day, we want to have both but to have success in the A-League you have to put together a very good squad. We just can’t hope our young players are going to do the work for us.”
When quizzed on whether he felt he had all the tools needed in his squad for the 2024-25 season, Veart said: “It’s always difficult when you’re building a squad, especially for the smaller clubs. For us, we have to release players to be able to bring players in, which makes it difficult.
“We always shop at different markets to some of the bigger clubs as well. You look at some of the quality in that Sydney FC, just high, high quality players.
“We do the best with our resources. That’s what we’ve always done as a club and it’s important we keep fighting and working. We still believe we’re a good enough team to win something this season.”
