The night Harimau Malaya and Ibrahim got stuck in Senayan

FOR millions of Indonesian football fans, it must have felt that the tsunami hit them twice in a matter of days almost 20 years ago.

Three days after the catastrophic tsunami triggered by an earthquake in north Sumatra wreaked havoc across the southern Asian shore, the Malaysian football team stemmed the red tide in the AFF Cup semi-final first leg clash at the Gelora Bung Karno in Senayan, Jakarta.

The visiting Harimau Malaya registered a rare win thanks to Liew Kit Kong’s double strike that silenced the roar of the hostile Senayan crowd.

It was Malaysia’s first win over Indonesia in Jakarta since Mokhtar Dahari produced the solitary goal in the 1979 SEA Games final.

The team manager in the 2004 edition of the AFF Cup was Datuk Seri Dr Ibrahim Saad (later Tan Sri) who passed away at the age of 78 on Friday.

With the stadium packed to the rafters, the players were told to stay at the centre circle as the crowd went wild after the match. The defeat was hard to swallow for Indonesia who were still grieving following the tsunami.

Only half an hour later, the team were divided into two groups as they were escorted by security personnel to walk back into the dressing room deep in the bowels of the stadium.

With emotions running high around the stadium, it was almost two hours later and way past midnight that the team were safely driven by bus back to their hotel.

Accompanied by former international defender-turned-policeman Bahwandi Hiralal as the security officer and Ahmad Khawari Isa as the team administrator, Ibrahim had to play the role of diplomat in seeking a peaceful solution for his men.

Under his care were fellow Malaysians that included the starting XI featuring Syamsuri Mustapha, Wan Rohaimi Ismail, Norhafiz Zamani Misbah, Muhamad Kaironnisam Sahabuddin Hussein, Fadzli Shaari, Shukor Adan, K. Nantha Kumar, Kit Kong, Khalid Jamlus and Amri Yahyah.

The match took place when the academician-turned-politician-turned sports supremo was virtually the darling of the establishment.

He enjoyed the implicit trust not only by the then Youth and Sports Minister, Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said but also the Sultan of Pahang, Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah, who was the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) president.

Within a year, Ibrahim was holding two key positions – chairman of the AsiaComm, in charge of the national elite athletes, and the general secretary of FAM.

Almost immediately after he was made the FAM general secretary on Sept 1, 2005, Ibrahim responded to a barrage of criticism in the media by calling for football to be made a national agenda.

Writing to a newspaper, Ibrahim said realistically the FAM alone could not develop the game as the governing body had their limitations.

He called for a well-structured sports specific plan which linked grassroots participation to international excellence by defining the critical steps along the way and urged the Government and the corporate sector to commit themselves as essential partners in delivering the outcomes.

“I believe that football is not an FAM agenda solely as I am a firm believer that it should be a ‘national agenda’. Everybody has to chip in by any means possible. We must work together, pool our resources, and translate our ideas, put on our thinking caps to improve football for the sake of national pride,” he wrote in the letter.

Ibrahim ended the letter by quoting Voltaire who wrote to M.de Riche on Feb 6, 1770, “Monsieur I ‘abbe” – I detest what you write but I would give my life for you to continue to write.”

The contents of the letter led to the formation of Harimau Muda financed by the National Sports Council (NSC) in 2007.

Under Ibrahim’s watch, the FAM began to spread their tentacles in their search for players who are directly connected to Malaysia, or heritage players in today’s parlance, to don the yellow and black jersey.

Always the gentleman in dealing with criticism, the former Deputy Chief Minister of Penang was laid to rest at the Bukit Kiara Muslim Cemetery yesterday after hundreds of family members and friends, ranging from political leaders, academicians and media personalities paid their last respects at the At-Taqwa Mosque in Taman Tun Dr Ismail (TTDI).

The nation also mourns the demise of Datuk Yeoh Choo Hock, who passed away peacefully on the same day at the age of 80.

From coaching to his role of technical assistant to the secretary general of Asian Basketball Confederation, now known as FIBA Asia, from 1983 to 1990, Choo Hock was fully committed to serve the basketball community at all levels – nationally, regionally, continentally and globally.

Both Ibrahim and Choo Hock will be missed.