Reds see glory, our clubs see red

With Johor Darul Ta’zim sweeping all before it, the Malaysian Super League looks doomed to be a one-horse race with most other clubs running out of steam and, more importantly, money.

WHAT a weekend it was for football fans.

First, Johor Darul Ta’zim beat Sri Pahang to win the Malaysia Cup. It was its fifth win in the last seven finals, a real cause to celebrate. The state even had a public holiday.

A day later, Liverpool thumped Tottenham to seal the English Premier League title in style. It was their 20th top flight victory in England, equalling Manchester United’s record.

The celebration was huge. Juer­gen Klopp had built the team but failed to achieve the target year after year. Finally, his successor Arne Slot did it, giving the Reds their first title since 2020.

That earlier one had been mar­red by the Covid-19 pandemic, which silenced all celebrations. Not this time, though. The fans jubilated gloriously, soaking in a long-awaited victory.

Both the matches – in Kuala Lum­pur and Liverpool – were exhi­larating. But what happened afterwards was what made the two stories so different.

After the game in England, they were talking about reinforcing Liverpool’s midfield and strike force with the commentators saying: “Winning the title is hard, retaining it is even harder.”

It was a far different story in Malaysia.

After the final on Saturday, the talk was not about reinforcements – it was about quitting this one-horse race called the Malaysian Super League.

JDT has now won a triple treble, staying unbeaten in all its matches since 2021. Every league game, every Cup game, every title – it has been all JDT.

Heck, it has won the Super Lea­gue title 11 times in a row and featured in six of the last seven Malaysia Cup finals.

It has equal­led Bayern Munich’s record of 11 league titles in a row and now looks headed for the world record of 15 consecutive titles held by Tafea FC of Vanuatu (1994-2009) and Skonto FC of Latvia (1991-2004).

One has to ask: Is JDT’s overwhelming dominance killing interest in the game?

Perak, once a powerhouse, has pulled out. It doesn’t have the money to sustain a challenge. Sri Pahang, the losing Malaysia Cup finalist, is also looking at pulling out.

What happened in the final – where Pahang took the lead, only to concede a penalty and lose a player to a red card before falling 1-2 – may have pushed the losing side over the edge.

Sarawak United, Melaka United and PJ City have already left the scene, along with Kelantan FC. Even Kedah and Kuala Lumpur City are under a cloud.

As things stand, we could just give all the top trophies to the Johor side before the start of the season, and then make secondary trophies for all the other teams to vie for.

To be fair, it’s not JDT’s fault that it is winning everything in sight. After all, it is doing what it needs to win. It is splurging money on the best players, coaches and facilities.

It is also buying foreign-born players, some of whom go on to become naturalised Malaysians.

The others just have to catch up. But there’s the Catch-22. With JDT winning it all, the crowds are not flocking to stadiums and the revenue is not flowing in. Without money, there is no way the other teams could even try to match the multi-million-dollar JDT side.

I remember the days when Malay­sian football was super competitive. Selangor was kingpin, but had fierce rivals in Penang, Perak and Singapore.

Even the Armed Forces, Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu made it to the finals – and then Kuala Lumpur came along. All had top players, from Mohktar Dahari and Santokh Singh to Namat and Shaharuddin Abdullah to Soo Toh Kim Poh and “the Camel” S. Rajagopal, not to mention Zainal Abidin Hassan, Dollah Salleh, Fandi Ahmad, K. Sundramoorthy and T. Pathmanathan.

They were all local-born stars.

It’s a different – and sad – story now. The Super League table tells the sorry story. After 24 matches, JDT had 70 points with 23 wins and a draw. Second-placed Selan­gor had only 52, ahead of Sabah’s 40 and Kuching’s 39. It is indeed a one-horse race.

One cannot ask JDT to become weaker, so moves must be made to make the others stronger. To do that, more money is needed, the kind of money that only JDT can afford now.

Big business has to get involved. We have many billion-dollar companies in the country – the banks, Tenaga Nasional, the telecommunications giants, and the oil and gas firms.

Somehow, they have to be convinced to get involved; maybe the government could give them tax breaks.

With more sponsors, teams could hire better players. We could even reduce the league to a six-team contest, with only the best available players seeing action.

It would mean many footballers will have to look for jobs elsewhere, but it would be better than going for months without salaries.

The idea then, now and always, is to produce top local players who can make country proud – not to buy expatriates.

One legend of yore – Santokh Singh – fears Malaysia will never ever qualify for the Olympics Games or the World Cup, the way things are going.

“We have 40-50 players in the Akademi Mokhtar Dahari (for junior elite footballers). How many of them are playing for the national team?” asks the man who featured in the 1980 team that qualified for the Olympics but did not go because of a boycott.

Santokh has a point. We need more top-class local players and cannot depend solely on naturali­sed foreign players. With local players, families, friends, neighbours, schoolmates and state-mates can feel proud. You don’t get that with foreigners.

For that, the Super League has to become more competitive with top-class local players.

It just isn’t worth the effort if you know you have no chance of winning. It would be far easier to sit back and support Liverpool, Manchester United or Arsenal.