{"id":11468,"date":"2026-05-14T19:36:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T19:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/11468\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T19:36:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T19:36:12","slug":"a-league-finals-news-newcastle-adelaide-auckland-sydney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/11468\/","title":{"rendered":"A-League finals news: Newcastle, Adelaide, Auckland, Sydney"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two rookie coaches, two very different stories, one very mutual connection.<\/p>\n

Airton Andrioli and Mark Milligan\u2019s pathways to the top two places on the A-League table in their debut seasons as a senior head coach could not be more distinct.<\/p>\n

Andrioli, 61, has waited an entire career for his shot, wondering if it might ever come, and has taken it.
Milligan, 40, has transitioned from Australian football legend to coach like he was born for it.<\/p>\n

Both have unleashed youthfully exuberant sides who play, mostly, swashbuckling football.<\/p>\n

And both called Carl Veart their boss in their last post \u2013 assistant coach at Adelaide United.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a credit to Mark and Airton and the work that they\u2019ve done to get to that point,\u201d a proud Veart told football360.com.au from Saudi Arabia, where he is currently coaching Australia\u2019s Under-17s.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cAirton\u2019s spent a long time in South Australian football in that development phase. So, I\u2019m very happy for him to see him get the success that he deserves. He\u2019s worked extremely, extremely hard and had to do things the hard way to get to where he is. And I\u2019m very happy that he\u2019s carrying on the Adelaide way that we want to go in developing the young players and giving them that opportunity.<\/p>\n

\u201cMark, once you have a conversation with Mark, you know that he\u2019s very focused and very driven. And I know that he will have success wherever he goes in football. And I think he\u2019s proven that this year so far, to win the Australia Cup and to then finish first in the league. just shows, the quality person that Mark is and the great coach that he is.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Mark Milligan enjoying a great night in Newcastle. <\/p>\n

Milligan settled in at Coopers Stadium when Veart needed a replacement for Ross Aloisi. Recommended by goalkeeping coach Eugene Galekovic, he had Veart convinced from their first cup of coffee.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew straight away from that coffee, the conversation we had about football that, I think you\u2019re going to have a very good career and we were very fortunate that he was happy to come to Adelaide and work with us,\u201d Veart recalled.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as he came in and started working with the players, you could see he\u2019s had a great career as a player under some great coaches. It didn\u2019t take long for him to get his thoughts across to the playing group on what he saw, what he needed to be successful. And we were very aligned on a lot of our philosophies.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was great working with Mark. As I said, he\u2019s very driven and knows where he wants to (go in) his coaching career.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

That said, could Veart have predicted this, being on the cusp of a treble \u2013 the Australian Cup, Premiership, with qualification to Asia and possibly the Championship?<\/p>\n

\u201cI suppose looking from the outside, people that haven\u2019t seen Mark work and how much work he puts into his coaching, would maybe see it as a surprise. But knowing Mark and working with Mark in that coaching way, I knew that he would have success,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, I suppose it\u2019s come very quickly.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut does it surprise me? No, because I know the type of person that he is.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Milligan has burst out of the blocks, Andrioli has played the long game.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the lesson to those dreamers out there from Andrioli\u2019s perseverance?<\/p>\n

\u201cConsistency. Airton hasn\u2019t changed,\u201d Veart said, without hesitation.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has his belief, similar to Mark on football, and he\u2019s been very consistent with that and just kept working and doing the right things.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Photo: Antonis Pagonis \/ Adelaide United<\/p>\n

He continued, explaining their shared passion for giving young players an opportunity, while working together in South Australia: \u201cWe were was frustrated our young players didn\u2019t get opportunities there and I remember we used to always have these discussions, me and Airton, saying our young players are just as good \u2013 we don\u2019t understand why they keep going and bringing other players into Adelaide when we had the players there.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo surprise that he\u2019s kept on going and Airton is very proud of the development and the pathway that he helped set up. It just shows that if the pathway is set up correctly, that players will come out at the other end.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andrioli reflected on his own journey last week in a conversation with Football360, revealing how he used to sit high in Coopers Stadium wondering if his moment would ever come. <\/a>Why had it not?<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes in football you have to be in the right place at the right time,\u201d Veart said. \u201cAnd then it\u2019s a matter of then taking that opportunity and don\u2019t let it pass by and be true to yourself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest thing as a coach. Too many coaches see other coaches and want to try be like that and not themselves in there. He\u2019s stayed true to himself and he\u2019s carried that over into his senior career from what I can see from the sideline. That\u2019s a credit to that belief that he has in himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, if both teams get past this week, does that present a challenge for Veart when his two sidekicks go head-to-head?<\/p>\n

\u201cWell Adelaide is my team,\u201d he beamed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m still a very, very strong Adelaide supporter. As I said it\u2019ll always be my team and there\u2019ll be no changing away from that. I still give these young boys here a little bit of stick about how good Adelaide is. I\u2019m always pushing Adelaide!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two rookie coaches, two very different stories, one very mutual connection. Airton Andrioli and Mark Milligan\u2019s pathways to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[395,957,7576,12292,8793,4708],"class_list":["post-11468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-adelaide","tag-adelaide","tag-adelaide-united","tag-airton-andrioli","tag-carl-veart","tag-mark-milligan","tag-newcastle-jets"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11468\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}