Football players "past and present" have "weighed into the debate whether to close down Football Federation Australia's Centre of Excellence based out of Canberra," according to Eamonn Tiernan of THE AGE. The FFA board met last week to discuss whether the Australian Institute of Sport program should "see out" its scheduled '19 finish or "pull the plug early and redistribute the funds." The argument for shutting the academy is that FFA spends "too much on developing just 24 players," while those who have been through the system "vouch for its value." Socceroos veteran and A-League side Melbourne Victory captain Carl Valeri came out of the AIS system and "can see both sides of the debate." Valeri said, "I was a product of the old AIS with Steve O'Connor, who took in slightly older players and really prepared them how to be a professional footballer abroad and in the national team." Sydney defender George Timotheou came through the Centre of Excellence three years ago and the teenager "praised the academy for earning a full-time contract with the Sky Blues this season." Timotheou said, "Coming out of that program and I thought it was very successful, a lot of the players who come out go on to get A-League contracts and if not straight away, most do eventually" (THE AGE, 4/25).