Wearing the red and black sets Ono's star rising again Top import: Injuries seemed to have put Shinji Ono's career in decline - but then came the approach from the Wanderers. IT SEEMS impossible to fathom now, but the Western Sydney Wanderers went within a whisker of never calling Shinji Ono one of their own. "Good, young, Australian players are proving they can do the job," Wanderers chairman Lyall Gorman said last May. That means clubs aren't as keen to go overseas for the big-name player as they used to be. From what I'm hearing, the Dwight Yorke-type of signing has dropped off the radar. That was club policy for several months, and a line they trumpeted proudly. Building a community name, went the saying, would be made a priority over foreign fame. Perhaps what they did not know at the time - or, more likely, what they thought could not be done - was that signing a marquee player would not necessarily compromise the club's mission to be an authentic part of western Sydney. "A marquee certainly wasn't on their radar for a long time, or at least that was the case until Alessandro Del Piero signed for Sydney FC," agent Lou Sticca recalled on Friday. I think that made them take notice. They started to think, 'Hang on, this could be something in us getting a marquee, too."' Two weeks after the deal to bring Del Piero to Sydney was made public, the Newcastle Jets landed their own big fish, Emile Heskey, straight out of the English Premier League. The Wanderers - or, more accurately, Football Federation Australia as the governing body then still tightly controlled the new club's affairs - decided to loosen the purse strings and see what was out there. "They started to make a few public utterings about a marquee, and when I saw they'd spoken to Michael Ballack, I knew they were opening up to it," Sticca says. I called [Wanderers general manager] John Tsatsimas to gauge their interest, and they were clearly quite keen. Ironically, the link between Sticca and Ono, 33, came from the deal he struck to bring Kazuyoshi "Kazu" Miura to Sydney FC in season one. "I've still had that relationship with some key contacts in Japan, and when I mentioned to them that I'd brought Alessandro to Sydney and that I was looking for someone big, they mentioned Shinji Ono straight away," he says. Money was an issue, at least temporarily. The FFA's opening offer was not anywhere near the $800,000 asking price, but, encouraged by Tony Popovic's belief Ono could be a key player, a compromise was reached. "Tony was always the keenest," Sticca says. He just loved him. He'd played with him in Japan, and knew what he was like. I have no doubt that was a huge factor. In the end, that made negotiations pretty smooth. Since that decision, it is not unfair to say that of all the marquees in the league this season, Ono has provided the most bang for buck. It's no secret the deal to bring Ono to Australia was a cause of debate in Whitlam Square. Few, in truth, knew who he was, and whether he would be worth the outlay. According to Tokyo-based journalist Scott McIntyre, who has followed Ono from the day he burst on the scene as a teenager, there are few bigger names in Japanese football. "If you asked any football fans in Japan who the three biggest stars have been in the past decade, most would say Hidetoshi Nakata, Shunsuke Nakamura and Shinji," McIntyre says. He's right up there with the greatest, without question - and we're talking about the golden generation of Japanese footballers. Like virtually every Japanese footballer, Ono is a product of the nation's famed high school system. The alumni of Ono's Shimizu Commercial High School reads like a conveyor belt for talent for the both the J-League and Blue Samurai. "The Shimizu region is basically the national hotbed for development," he says. They've produced countless good young players, all with that excellent technique. Within six months in 1998, Ono went from starring at the famous All-Japan High School Soccer Tournament - the nation's largest amateur sporting event - to signing for the biggest club in Japan, Urawa Red Diamonds, and going to the 1998 World Cup in France. He was still only 18 years old. "But he really turned it on a year later at the World Youth Championships," McIntyre says. Japan made the final, played brilliant football, and Shinji was captain and a complete standout [scoring against England in the group stages and against Mexico in the quarter-final]. That team is still regarded as the greatest Japanese youth team of all time and that generation - Naohiro Takahara, Koji Nakata, Yasuhito Endo, Mitsuo Ogasawara and Ono, plus Hidetoshi and Shunsuke [a few years older] - was the nucleus of the 2006 World Cup team. Ono's legend grew as he spurned offers from Europe to stay with Urawa, even though they were relegated to the Japanese second division. But after helping them back up, he eventually succumbed at the age of 21. His destination was one of the continent's most storied clubs, Dutch giants Feyenoord. Pascal Bosschaart, now of Sydney FC, had the task of trying to quell Ono when his Utrecht side crossed paths with the Rotterdam team. "He was like the David Beckham of Japan at that point," Bosschaart recalls. That guy had the most amazing technique. His touch was like a nine or 10 out of 10. Skill-wise, the guy had everything. I remember that he had probably six or seven Japanese journalists who just followed him around everywhere. Probably the craziest thing I can remember was when they made a television show about his dog in Japan. He was that big. Bosschaart did not have to worry about marking him forever - he joined Ono at Feyenoord in 2005. Shinji was just the most friendly, humble guy. But then he was just so talented on the field. I think Pierre van Hooijdonk [who scored a double in the 2002 UEFA Cup triumph] was Feyenoord's big star when Shinji started, but he was right up there. But the land of the rising sun was calling, and it was Socceroos boss Holger Osieck, then in charge of Urawa, who brought him back. "He returned to Japan as a superstar," Osieck said this week. He was the darling of supporters and media. Shinji brought a wealth of experience from Europe back to Japan, which made him particularly [unique] in our squad. His technique is outstanding. His vision and decision-making was excellent. He always found solutions in tight area, and scored some fabulous goals. However, the injuries mounted and Ono's career stalled. He tried to revive himself in Germany's Bundesliga with Bochum, and then in his home town of Shimizu, with S-Pulse. Although he showed glimpses at both clubs, his career appeared in terminal decline. Some thought he could even follow the legendary Nakata into early retirement. "The grind of playing in Japan seemed to be too much and, by the end, he was still a huge identity, but he was struggling to play more than 60 minutes," McIntyre says. When he went to the Australia, I suppose many people thought that was it. Instead he's found a place where things are working out. It's wonderful to see him playing so well again.