When Koeman and Gullit were too expensive for NFDP

THE Mokhtar Dahari Academy (AMD), the jewel in the crown for the National Football Development Programme (NFDP), has again become a subject of debate within the football fraternity.

Word on the grapevine is that the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) want to run AMD, the apex in the development pyramid that houses the best footballing talents under the age of 17. And they are close to getting it.

Located in Gambang, not far from Kuantan, AMD was first built in 2012 but launched in 2014. Any football purist would say the guardians of the sport should run the elite academy reserved for the cream of the crop.

As it is, the whole project is funded by the government, with a unit within the National Sports Council (NSC) managing its affairs administratively. Nowhere in the world the football academy is not run by the guardians of the game.

But of course, it all boils down to cents, rather than sense.

If the NSC or FAM were blessed with the riches, either Ronald Koeman or Ruud Gullit would have been made the first director of NFDP in 2011.

When NFDP was first established in 2010 close on the heels of the gold medal won by Datuk K. Rajagobal’s boys in the Laos SEA Games in 2009, the noble intention then was for the government, through the Youth and Sports Ministry, to run the grassroots programme and ease FAM’s financial burden.

Eventually, a committee chaired by the then Deputy Sports Minister, Datuk Razali Ibrahim, was set up and it was agreed that FAM would be running the NFDP age group leagues and manage the national teams, while NSC were tasked to focus on development.

By May 2010, the Football Unit was established within the NSC structure, with Jefri Ngadirin as the head tasked to identify 14 centres as the core of the project.

“At that point of time, the Ministry, NSC and FAM were working hand in glove.

“AMD was modelled after the Everton academy in Finch Farm,” said Ibrahim Mohamed, who prepared the concept paper in his capacity as the deputy technical director of NFDP.

NFDP was very much similar to that of the tripartite project involving the NSC, FAM and the Malaysian Schools Sports Council (MSSM) called Tunas Cemerlang introduced in 1989. Except that NFDP had a director Lim Kim Chon and supported by a dedicated unit.

Under Tunas Cemerlang, the selection of students to undergo training at these centres was left to the state FAs, not the NSC nor the MSSM.

Among the Centres of Excellence were Setapak High School in Kuala Lumpur, English College in Johor and Sultan Abdul Hamid College in Kedah.

To further impose their technical expertise, FAM identified 12 academies nationwide that came directly under their purview in 1995. Unfortunately, after six years, FAM admitted the academies turned out to be a very, very expensive flop.

Although the likes of Akmal Rizal Ahmad Rakhli, Irwan Fadzli Idrus and Norhafiz Zamani Misbah had emerged from the ranks, favouritism in selection of candidates, lack of quality food, irregular payment of allowances, deplorable living conditions, and lack of attention led to its downfall.

A staggering 111 players were dropped over five years. Of this figure, 36% was due to disciplinary problems while the rest were because of poor performances.

An earlier project under FAM did not survive long. It was in June 1991 when FAM launched the National Football Academy based in Kuantan.

Three staff have been recruited to handle their training and welfare – chief coach Datuk M. Karathu, his assistant Irfan Bakti Abu Salim and the warden Yunus Aziz.

Among the products were Asmawi Bakiri, B. Rajanikandh, Tuan Kamree Tuan Yahya and Azrin Shah Zainal who all made the cut to Claude Le Roy’s Olympic squad in 1994.

History suggests FAM have had their share of failures in running academies in the mould of NFDP.

A possible solution is for NSC, with an annual budget of almost RM20mil to run AMD alone, to steer a tight ship while giving FAM the right to appoint the technical experts.