Winds of change?

KUALA LUMPUR: It WAS their fourth meeting since 2010. Naturally, the FA of Malaysia (FAM) Exco took over four hours to discuss various matters — from management to matchfixing.

The meeting was chaired by FAM deputy-president Tengku Abdullah Shah. The Exco was supposed to meet only four times a year.

It was Tengku Abdullah who wanted the Exco meetings, even informally once a month.

Those who sat through the meetings could sense a wind of change. It was obvious Tengku Abdullah had taken over the reins from the president, Sultan Ahmad Shah, who is also his father.

“It is clear he wants to clear the deadwood in FAM. He only wants to work with sincere members,” said an Exco member who declined to be named.

This include introducing radical changes by 2022 with reforms in the national teams and leagues.

When told that the current format of the league needed, Tengku Abdullah apparently replied: “I’m working on it” and that “the decision may not be popular”.

The Exco was told of a decision by the disciplinary board, an independent body that operates outside the Exco, late last year. This regarded the suspension of 18 President’s Cup players from Negri Sembilan (6 players), T-Team (6) and MP Muar (6) for two to five years for being involved in matchfixing last season.

To that Tengku Abdullah said; “This is to show the seriousness of FAM and I hope this serves as a lesson to the players and officials in FAM tournaments.

“We hope this will be taken seriously especially by those involved. We want sincere people in football.”

The Exco also decided teams that paid their players late would not be allowed to play their matches.

Also, FAM want to see more teams being financially independent but Perlis FA — playing in the second-tier Premier League — received financial assistance from the Perlis government.

The quality of foreign players this year was questioned as almost every team had ditched players and the registration date extended to Feb 13 — as clear indication teams failed to secure the right players for the season.


Other matters which Tengku Abdullah was concerned about

Weaknesses in administration: “We’ll identify weaknesses in the national body and our affiliates. Wages must be paid every month.

We have placed deputy secretary-general Kelly Sathiraj in charge of this. If teams default, their next match would be considered a walkover with the three points awarded to the opponents.

We’ll also upgrade our website and there must be proper communication among the Exco members. We also need to be open to criticisms.”

On Tengku Ismail Sultan Iskandar announcing on twitter he was the new Johor FA president and that FAM was not aware of his “appointment”: “It’s good and we welcome him.”

(Azzudin stressed “FAM were not informed of Tengku Ismail’s appointment in writing” but was quick to add “Johor FA are in the midst of conducting their congress to conduct the election”.)

On monitoring players in the league: “The names of the players and officials will be handed to an independent body which will check if the names are clean or if they were involved in any unhealthy activity. We will blacklist them.”