bouncyWhat this cup is about?
The AFF Suzuki cup is a football competition contested by the national teams of Southeast Asia, the winner will be crown as Southeast Asia champion.
It is a 2 yearly competition and the past winner is almost always between Thailand and Singapore (3 each) with Vietnam is/was the reigning champion at the moment as they won it last time but was defeated by Malaysia :D in the semifinal , to make them through to the final meeting with Indonesia after they defeated Philippines, whoever win is a new record nonetheless.
FINAL-1st leg
National Stadium Bukit Jalil Kuala Lumpur
26 DEC 2010
2000 local time
1300 CET
1200 GMT
Why it is hostile? Well it actually quit comparable to el clasico.. Not in entirely but comparable.. Even though we are a multicultural and multi ethnicity but most Malaysian and Indonesian are from the same root and language but the difference is in political economical aspect of course, we are a different country after all. The Indonesian team might be playing in our soil but we have so many Indonesian immigrant in Malaysia they will feel no different. Think Germany vs Turkey in Berlin.. yeah just like that minus Mesut lol. Speaking of Mesut I miss him already.. sigh I need RM match asap or daily.. back to topic.
The Indonesian supporters are no doubt are more aggressive than Malaysian (but we r no angel either:p), it is not that we are less passionate but the political aspect of the two country is rather complicated and Indonesian just recently had really bad campaign against Malaysia. Not gonna comment on that, but on personal level I have no hatred for Indonesian, we r practically brothers. Hopefully things improved.
The chances of a hostile match is greater in Malaysia than in Indonesia as we are having a less Malaysian staying in Indonesia or going to the match. Even though they decide to limit the number of Indonesian supporters, I expect half of the stadium will be Indonesian. Please behave, Malaysians.
One thing I fear beside the hostility is that if we play badly, we will ourselves boo the team, we would boo and thrash our own team more than the Indonesian could do to us. I know it’s bad but idk, I also had the tendency to trash them right away if they suck tbh, (a pessimist huh).. but thankfully they have been awesome so far
I’ll try my best not to do that though, after all we were finally in the final after 14 years (which BTW is the first final in this tournament). Clap Clap Clap.
Sigh that sound so bad, we use to be good then corruption destroy us (not that simple but whatever). This is a very young team and even if they suck, they have a bright future, so I will give them my support.
After all those rant here I present to you whoever reading, our nation pride right now
The Malaysia National Football Team
Nick name
Harimau (tiger)
Our younger squad U23, U21 and so on is called Harimau Muda (Harimau=Tiger, Muda=young) Young Tiger or Tiger cub lol doesn’t sound too intimidating now.
The current football squad consists mostly of tiger cubs ;) (14 out of 22 are under 23)
The Jersey
Doesn’t look that bad, I prefer the blue one.. Heck Idk, I’m not that fond of a yellow color actually. The stripes supposedly reminiscent of a tiger stripes
Oh BTW it’s from Nike, we betrayed Adidas in 2007 (who had sponsored our jersey since the 70s) and it made out of recycled plastic bottles lol
But it is the same material as the recent World Cup team kits :)
The Couch
K. Rajagopal, 54 year old, is a former national striker.
Nickname "King Raja" (Raja means king) after guiding Malaysia's Under-23 side to its first gold medal in 20 years at the 2009 Southeast Asian Games in Laos where the team defeated Vietnam 1-0 in the final.
He was first a couch to Malaysia U-20 (2004-2006) then U-19 (2007-2009) and he won Malaysia Premier League with the U-19 team aka the ‘tiger cubs’ before becaming the national head couch.
In July 2009, Rajagopal coached Malaysia in two games against the visiting English champions, Manchester United FC, losing in both matches 2–3 and 0–2.
He have his own TV show, sort of.. as a guest to a football tv show broadcasting to Malaysia and Brunei, FourFourTwo TV Show.
The Team
Malaysia is one of the Southeast Asia team, who manage to go through to the knockout round of 16 in the 2010 Asian Games beside Thailand and Vietnam. But only Thailand manage to reach quarter final but loss to Japan which later became Asian Champion.
Oh have I mention we won the last SEA (Southeast Asian) games, oh yes I did :). Malaysia defeated the defending champion Thailand and beat Laos to the final and beat Vietnam to win the gold medal
The Home Stadium
Located in the capital city of Malaysia Kuala Lumpur, is a 100,200 capacity all-seater
The route to the final
Malaysia was in group A with host Indonesia, Thailand and Laos. (aka The Group of Death)
Malaysia begins their campaign badly with an embarrassing loss of 5-1 against Indonesia.
They bounced back from their defeat and later drew 0-0 against Thailand and beat Laos 5-1.
By achieving 4 points, Malaysia qualified to the semi finals as runner up (Thailand screw up I guess and drew 2-2 against Laos) and met Group B winners and the defending champions Vietnam.
At the first leg, Malaysia won 2-0 against Vietnam at home soil and later drew goalless at the second leg. The final aggregate was 2-0 to Malaysia.
Indonesia on the other hand not only wins all group matches, they trashed Malaysia 5-1 (though, one of their goal is actually ours as it own goal :p) trampled Laos 6-0, beat Thailand 2-1 and defeated the Philippines in semi final with 1-0 both away and home, securing 2-0 aggregate (though I believe both are home game, so it’s not fair lol)
Cool fact
We were once Asian giant in 1970s. Competing in the international level, qualify to olympics game twice.
Beating USA once! I know I know not much but still.. huhu. Had wins 2-0 against Arsenal FC and draw 1-1 against England! Not bad, but neither of us here alive then though.. lol
I don't know what happened between 80s to the 90s, but i have vague memory the joy in the early 90s and it was awesome, especially monetary wise with player earn a big fat salary and we had so much passion in our domestic league, we used to have Singapore team in our league and the rivalry is lively, before it start crumble.
We were downhill 1994 onward thanks to the one of the biggest bribery scandal in the country. I think, we (some players) sold the match to Singapore as they wear their team jersey but play for their opponent or so to say.
Then people loss interest in the game. The cult following of local team start became nonexistent and the domestic league was hit badly. People also start to turn their interest to the Europe league mostly EPL.
The corruption had done us so bad, it take us 14 years to get back up, hopefully history won’t repeat itself. The domestic league now seems on the rise.
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Malaysia vs Vietnam -1st leg
Safee, he score both winning goal vs Vietnam
In training.. Orange looks cooler
The most likely starting eleven
Don’t take my word though I hardly in contact/follow my own national team. :(
I had to do a research for this piece. True story. Mostly steal from unproven source, wikipedia :p
This is definitely not a preview to the match, so I don't include much on the Indonesia football team side of the story.
My prediction? Manita is ours this time! We gonna score 5 against them and just park the bus on 2nd leg :). Joking aside, I must admit we are the underdog..
May the better team win, although I don't mind a lucky win. This is football!
Gracias
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