Kosmina joined the likes of Gold Coast United owner Clive Palmer and Socceroos coach Holger Osieck in airing the disappointment with the domestic competition this week.

National coach Osieck openly questioned the desire of Australia's young locally based talent which was significant following the Olyroos' failure to qualify for this year's London Olympics.

The Olyroos failed to register a single goal as they became the first Australian side since 1984 to miss the Olympics.

Kosmina directed his comments at the broader spectrum of the A-League when he spoke on Thursday.

"It's not just young players, I think a lot of players are inconsistent in the A-League," Kosmina said.

"That's an issue with the game in Australia and we need to set standards and maintain them.

"Players can't just be good 10 minutes in a game or be good for one game and have a couple of weeks off, they need to be good every game - that's how football in Australia should be.

"Full-time football is full-time football ... you organise your life around football and not your football around your life."

Quizzed on whether coaches are to blame for the lack of quality pushing their case for a Socceroos berth, Kosmina suggested it was players' 'philosophies and attitudes' that were at the root of the problem.

"It's not about coaching, I think it's more about the philosophies and attitudes of players ... that is probably getting a little too deep but we need to start driving things like that," Kosmina said.

"The A-League is not a standard where you have readymade players - you have players coming in who still a need a lot of work.

"They need to learn a lot about the game and about football in terms of their position, team and philosophy behind the game and why they even play."

The former Sydney FC coach also had a simple solution to fix the under-fire A-League players.

"It's a mental thing and how you apply yourself at training," Kosmina said.

"Even if you have a bad session, if your attitude is right and you apply yourself to what you're trying to do at training and what is trying to be achieved, then you'll find that the weekends will start to work out a little bit better.

"You train to play, so you get your head down at training, work hard at what you do and if you make a mistake you make sure you don't repeat and fix it.

"You only get out what you put in, the more you put in, the more you get out ... it doesn't necessarily happen straight away but it will eventually if you keep applying yourself."

Adelaide United take on Newcastle Jets at Hunter Stadium on Friday night needing nothing less than a win to keep their faint hopes of a top-six finish alive.

The Reds have made no changes to the side that lost 2-1 to Sydney FC last week while the Jets have included Olyroo Ben Kantarovski, striker Labinot Haliti and former U-17 Joey James Virgili at the expense of captain Jobe Wheelhouse (groin).