football in Malaysia..

Once again..before I go any further, I'd firstly like to clarify that I may not be the qualified person to talk about the quality of football in Malaysia. And what u're about to read will be totally based on my personal opinion. It was in 1990 when I first watched a football game in Stadium MPS, Seremban (exactly where Seremban Parade is located now). It was the game between N.9 and Terengganu, and the game ended with a win to the home team by 3-1 score. And that was the only time I went to watch a game in that stadium. Within the same year, the new stadium had been constructed just nearby the place where I used to stay.. Stadium Tuanku Abdul Rahman or Stadium Paroi.. and my crazy life as a fan to N.9 team started since then.

I still remember just how during each match, there were quite a big number of spectators in that stadium. The league was known as Liga Semi-Pro during those years, and N.9 team had just been promoted to 1st division. Marian Valach was one of the imported player for N.9 team and was so popular among N.9 fan at that time. Ticket price was RM8 per game if I'm not mistaken.. Even now, the price of the ticket is RM10. An increment of RM2 over the long period of time huh~? And I remember this specific time, number of spectators became bigger and bigger.. especially during the time when Lim Tiong Kim, Robert Bozik and Miroslav Bozik were among the key players of the team. Even then, along came this twins.. Khairil Zainal and Faizal Zainal with few other chinese players like Ching Hong Aik and Chow Chee Weng, number of spectators were still very big. And I could never forget the last N.9 game that I went to watch. It was the final game of Malaysian Cup in 2000 between N.9 and Perak at Shah Alam Stadium. Unfortunately N.9 lost the game that night by 2-0. I hate Khalid Jamlus~! :p

Six years later, I went to watch them played the final game of Malaysian Cup at Nasional Stadium. It was N.9 againts Perlis where they lost again by 2 goals to 1..what surprised me most was, the number of spectators during that final game. What was going on~? I thought Malaysian Cup is the most prestigous cup there is in Malaysia, and all these years.. no matter where the final game was played at, spectators will be consuming the entire seats of the stadium.. even the games were broadcasted live on tv.. People are not interested in watching in stadium anymore~? This is bad.. truly bad. No wonder many football associations are experiencing financial problems nowadays. They failed to sell the tickets. As a results, they could not afford to pay the salaries to their players.

Now, let us try to figure out the factors why people are not interested in watching football in stadiums anymore. I can see so many people are still watching live football games at Mamak restaurants. But most of the time, they'll either watch World cup games, Euro cup, UEFA Champions League or Barclay Premier League games. Even the game is played at 3.00 am in the morning, yet many people are still watching it. Even if they do watch local games, it will only happen when Malaysian team stepped into the final of whatever footbal tournaments. So the point here is that, the interest is still there. But what keeps them away from local stadiums~? Does it have anything to do with price of the ticket~? I don't think so.. what is RM10 to them~? If I'm not mistaken, ticket price per game at Old Trafford is at the average of £40 (RM213). And yet they managed to sell all tickets even when the game is still 2 months away. Of course they do have this kind of season pass.. but why can they keep all seats fully occupied during each game~? And we're talking about big capacity, carrying over 80,000 spectators at a time.

We've been seeing lots of effort have been thrown by Football Association of Malaysia in order to bring back the beauty of local football to the eyes of the spectators. But still, no one borthers to go watching a game at stadium. It was in 1989 when Malaysia hosted the Sea Games, and won gold medals in football. And that was the last time Malaysia ever won gold, right until now.. Man, I really hate supporting Italian team in the World cup..because I am 'Malaysian'..... but I don't think I can see much of Malaysian team in international tournaments. I guess it's a 'dream on' if I could stand a chance to watch their actions in the World Cup huh~!!

Conclusion, the quality of local football can never gets back to where it actually belongs.. as long as the President of FAM is still there..(Daulat Tuanku~!!) In the Europe, a manager will be sacked if his team is not performing well. It only takes few defeats..and the manager will be immediately replaced by another. But here in Malaysia, even if the national team has not been performing for decades.. the most that we could see was when the Vice President of FAM stepped down voluntarily....
You know what that means~? ...........................................'dream on'