Readers comment on The malaise in Malaysian football . (Suggestions and feedback can reach Rentakini at francis@malaysiakini.com Selected letters will be published)

Train them young

YOUR article that God may have a reason to cry for the present state of Malaysian football has to be the joke of the day.

But I must also salute you for highlighting the plight or rather, the current state of affairs, in Malaysian football.

I am very annoyed to read that nobody seems to have an answer as to why our football standard in now in the doldrums. I feel sorry for my country to hear that our standard has declined so drastically over the past years.

However, I will attempt an answer and it is that we have neglected our grassroots development for more than 20 years.

World class football players of today like David Beckham, Thierry Henry, Ronaldinho, Park Ji Sung etc all started training professionally in football academies as young as nine years old.

So what FAM or our government should do now is to set up training centres in every state for potential players (say about 30 of them at one intake) under 12 years of age. They will train the whole year round until they reach the age of 16.

Imagine the pool of players we can pick from in all the states that have trained these young players professionally.

But then again, we must be reminded that these centres should be run and managed professionally by people who know football and not busybody politicians or royalty who seem to enjoy poking their noise into almost everything in our country these days. - MC Yong

Not team players, only individuals

WHY waste your effort writing about a lost cause?

If you look at the sports in which our country had taken part in, you would have noticed a very familiar trend - that no Malaysian team had ever won anything in a team event. (Put aside the Thomas Cup victory of 1992. That was a long time ago and we had won that Cup before.)

It is true that no Malaysian team has won or qualify for any team event worth mentioning be it in football, hockey, rugby, and not even sepak takraw. Why?

Well, we fail miserably if it is a team sport - not an individual event. How can a team perform or function if there is no team, only individuals.

Ivory Coast can qualify for the World Cup. Why? Look carefully at their team and you can see the answer. They play and click together as a team. Ivory Coast is an example of a team playing together, not 11 individuals out for personal glory.

If you compare that with the Malaysian football team in recent times, you will see why God does not have to cry at all because we will never qualify for the World Cup or any other team sports for a long, long time, possibly never.

Still, we can continue to cheer for other nations in 2010, 2014, 2018 and so on. - Not Team Member

Why stadium was almost empty?

I'VE read your article about the state of Malaysian football now in Rentakini . One thing that I agree with you is our team is now in really bad shape.

But I disagree a lot with your opinion on this year's Malaysia Cup final because you did not give facts to justify it. Your views were based on emotion and ignorance.

For your information, I'm big fan of football be it the foreign league or local one. That means I do follow everything closely and I have to say that an ignorant point of view carries no weight.

How come you made your conclusion based on this year's Malaysian Cup final? Did you watch last year's final or the year before particularly when Perak played?

This year's final did not attract a lot of people because Perlis fans were unable to travel so far to watch the final in Kuala Lumpur as they did last year. The point is Perlis did not send the numbers to fill the stadium.

As for Negri Sembilan (the other finalist this year), their fan base has never been as strong as Perak, Kedah, Selangor, Pahang, Terengganu or Kelantan. So next time, please do your research first before you write.

I'm now writing from Vietnam, so I cannot write you a long letter.

But I also want to thank you for your concern about Malaysian footbal. Not many people do! - Zulhabri Supian

Azalina can do a lot!

NOW that out football standard is out in the open, I hope our Sports Minister Azalina Othman will do her utmost to bring the standard up a notch.

We all know that Azalina enjoys all kinds of sports herself. She is known as a martial arts exponent. Good for her.

I have a feeling that Azalina can do a lot for Malaysian sports if she put her heart and mind into it. It is always easier for a minister who knows the subject matter her ministry is involved with to bring about changes for the better.

It has been almost three years since Azalina became the sports minister and sadly, there has not been much to shout about during her watch so far.

I hope she is not distracted by all the nonsense going on in the country and she should now concentrate on putting up a plan of action to improve the standard of Malaysian football to start with.

Football has a large following in the country and Azalina will get a lot of support from Malaysians if she gets down to do the right thing for the sport. - C Nathan