There would be a nice symmetry if he did finish up there though. It was after the Olympic qualifier played there that he and at least one other player sought asylum.
Doubt he is up to it, despite his heart and athleticism. Quality we expect is much higher than his last years.
Another worldie from Jordy:
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Charles has gone to Sutherland Sharks for the rest of the season.
Good move for him, hope he does well.
Sharks play SFC at Seymour Shaw 630 this Saturday evening.
Former A-League star Stuart Musialik opens up on his mental health battles
Emma Kemp, The Sunday Telegraph
May 12, 2019
The world was at their feet, young Australian footballers blessed with the talent to stand on the verge of fame and fortuneā¦ and then life took a twist that changed their world forever. Emma Kemp continues our series looking back at players whose careers ended all too soon.
On some nights, Stuart Musialik would lie in bed visualising himself playing football in front of thousands of fans.
On others, heād think about killing himself.
Then heād pretend like it never happened.
āI wouldnāt tell anyone I was having those thoughts,ā Musialik tells The Sunday Telegraph
āIād wake up in the morning and think, āBetter not say a lot about that oneā. Iād think to myself, āOne day Iām going to die the same way that dad didā.ā
Musialikās father Fred was 45 when he committed suicide.
His son, a talented footballer, was just 15 and he would later realise he, too, had severe depression and bipolar disorder.
It would chew up and spit out his professional career well before his prime after he had been groomed as a Socceroo by Guus Hiddink and starred at the 2008 Olympics, not to mention A-League championships with the Newcastle Jets and Sydney FC.
But behind the crafty midfield distribution, there was self-imposed isolation, panic attacks and all-enveloping melancholy, experiences now driving him to raise awareness about mental health issues.
At 34, and having just decided to hang up his boots for good from NPL side Hamilton Olympic, Musialik says heās still not 100 per cent.
āIām probably 70, maybe even 80,ā he says. āBut compared to where I was three or four years ago, itās light years.ā
On the weekend he lost his father, Musialik was in Sydney trialling for the NSW Institute of Sport. Musialik and his siblings couldnāt reach their dad on the phone for Fatherās Day and it wasnāt until their uncle eventually called in at his place that he was discovered in his car.
āA couple of weeks before he did it, he told me heād been suicidal but he was through it now and would be around for another 20 years,ā Musialik says.
āI didnāt know what to do. What do you when youāre 15 years old and your dad tells you heās suicidal?ā
Looking back, Musialik can identify the moments his dad was having a manic episode: how āheād get that look in his eyesā and concoct conspiracies about people out to get him.
He can remember visiting him in hospital but not understanding what it all meant.
āBack in those days, it wasnāt really spoken about,ā he says.
Musialik would later soon recognise similar symptoms in himself that he believes were more intense because he hadnāt allowed himself to grieve.
Coaches and school teachers offered time off but he put on his poker face and pushed on.
āI definitely didnāt deal with it when it happened, which was probably one of the reasons I struggled so badly later in life,ā he says.
āWhen it did hit me, it hit me hard.ā
Whenever the pain of his loss threatened to creep in, he shut it down and focused on football ā the one space where the cloud would lift and he truly felt free.
Initially that release was swiftly rewarded and the 16-year-old Newcastle Breakers youth player was signed up at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra, before returning to play first grade for Newcastle in the final days of the National Soccer League.
It was during the next few months, before the A-League started, that he suffered his first severe bout of depression and anxiety.
He was 19 and had started drinking heavily and using drugs, mostly ecstasy, which caused serious stomach problems.
Regardless, he set off for the 2005 Under-20 World Cup in the Netherlands where a certain Lionel Messi steered Argentina to the trophy.
āI just remember the atmosphere,ā Musialik says. āThinking to myself, āThis is unbelievable, this is what I want to doā.ā
Musialikās Olyroos coach Graham Arnold put him forward to Hiddink for a pre-2006 World Cup training camp.
āHe had all the talent,ā recalls Arnold, who took him to the Beijing Olympics and years later would visit him in hospital during the many sessions of electroconvulsive therapy.
āThis is a big statement, but he was probably a very similar style of player to (Barcelonaās) Sergio Busquets.
āHe read the game very, very well for a young kid. He was always one step ahead and could see things other players couldnāt see.ā
Musialik went into camp carrying an injury but pushed through the physical pain in pursuit of mental relief alongside the golden generation.
āIt definitely lifted while I was there,ā he says. āWhen I was in those environments where it was basically just football, football, football, that was the best thing for me.
āIt was when I was away from that, even playing the A-League, (that it returned).ā
On the surface, Musialik was a reliable midfield presence in the Jetsā first few seasons and played a key role in the title-winning team of 2007-08.
āHis football brain is the best Iāve played with,ā says Tarek Elrich, his then teammate and ābrother from another montherā
āHe could have played in the highest leagues of Europe and for the Socceroos.ā
Musialikās problem with the A-League was generally the afternoons, those empty hours after training when heād slip into dark nothingness. There started the āvicious cycleā of drinking and drugs after games.
āI was in a very bad way behind the scenes,ā Musialik says.
āWhat I was doing on the pitch masked what was really happening ā¦ at the end of the day thatās why Iāve been cut short and why I didnāt do it for as long as I should have.ā
Elrich was there through it all and says many people didnāt fully understand what his friend was going through.
āHe can go from laughing and joking to sitting there with a blank stare looking straight through you,ā Elrich says.
With then-Socceroos coach Guus Hiddink at Rotterdam airport in 2006 after Musialik trained with the team ahead of the World Cup in Germany.
āI remember a lot of those moments. And it was out of his control ā he could do everything right but the majority of the time it would get the better of him.ā
There were bouts of panic before games that gave him chest pains so bad he was convinced he was having a heart attack.
āIād be getting the team doc to check my heart,ā Musialik says.
āHeād listen to my chest and say everything was fine. Iām like, that canāt be.ā
Other times heād sleep 14 hours a night and another five during the day but still feel exhausted.
The tipping point came in late 2006, when he locked himself inside his unit for days.
Worried Jets coach Gary van Egmond and teammate Craig Deans turned up to find a barely functioning young man. They took him straight to the club doctor.
Musialik was put on antidepressants and got through the campaign, but it wasnāt until the off-season he was diagnosed with bipolar and his medication changed for the better.
āIt might sound weird but I was actually relieved because I finally had an answer to why I was feeling the way I was,ā he says.
āEven when I was at school, I wondered why nothing was ever just normal ā everything was either really good or really bad.ā
A stint at Sydney FC brought another title and a period of calm, but he grew homesick and asked for a move back to Newcastle.
Musialik with then-Newcastle coach Gary Van Egmond at a Jets recovery session.
The Sky Blues withdrew their offer of a contract extension and Musialik, worrying that football was no longer providing the same elevated feeling, stopped taking his mood stabilisers.
Mania set in for a time, and a big bender followed. He began to feel flat, so he doubled his antidepressant dose, and that pepped him up enough to play out the 2011 Asian Champions League with Sydney before slipping out of contract.
Arnold, who Musialik describes as a father-like figure, offered him a lifeline at Central Coast.
āHe wasnāt in a great mental state,ā says Arnold.
By then, Musialik had already halved his antidepressants again and was suffering withdrawal symptoms so severe he was admitted to hospital.
He could hardly train with the Mariners. More often than not Arnold would sit him down next to him on the sideline during sessions to keep him involved.
āI ended up in and out of hospital that year and having a lot of that shock therapy,ā Musialik says. āThat was the start of a few years where I was a bit pear-shaped.ā
Musialik pulled the pin on his professional career at 26 and has improved dramatically, playing part-time for Adamstown Rosebud and then Hamilton.
Heās lost 20kg and medical support has helped correct stomach issues.
Until recently, he worked part-time at his mum and stepdadās engraving company in Newcastle and, like his late father, is about to start helping a friend coach kids while he contemplates the next chapter.
āI donāt walk around with a sign on my forehead saying āI suffer from mental health issuesā,ā he says.
āBut Iāve never thought twice about talking about it or being open about it.ā
If you are experiencing depression or are suicidal, or know someone who is, help is available.
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Really brave stuff from Stuey there, glad to hear heās doing better.
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Glad to hear heās doing better but thatās a harrowing read. Remember he wasnāt too popular around here during his time with us and a lot of comments about him being a master of the backwards pass.
Unhappy result for Vuka overnight, a 3-2 loss away at 2nd placed Brugge.
2 games to go, and the lead is now 3 points. Need 4 from those games to make sure.
This is a really interesting piece on Gersbach, really highlighting how hard he has found it over in Europe:
Vuka won the league and his side secured a spot in the champions league next season
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Nice piece hereā¦
How good for Dannyā¦ what an awesome few years heās had. Couldnāt happy to a better bloke.
Heās preaching to the Genk fans, of course his career highlight was winning the title with us
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George Timotheou starting for Schalke in Bundesliga right now.
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Thatās awesome, good on the lad. 90 mins as well.
Vedran āKalacās Sonā Janjetovic with 1 or 2 other HAL players.
itās bloopers from the a-leagueā¦