The dire news is that the Malaysian swimmers won’t be able to use it on usual routines, but have to let the Australian national swimming squad to use it for acclimatisation process instead. [Thestar]

Not blaming the Aussies, they showed vision in renting the facility in 2005, that’s what a proper government related bodies should do… I call it proper planning. It would be nice if they could share the pool with Malaysians, but it’s their call, and it was us who gave them the rights.

Questions are, who were responsible for making the deal at the first place? Did the management of The National Sports Complex and National Sports Institute checked the schedule before agreeing the deal with the Aussies? What’s the excuse of not anticipating that our Olympic squad will be using the facility at the peak of preparation for the Olympic Games.

It’s not like Malaysians are having good chances to win a medal or two; but we have spend millions of ringgits and the swimmers and coaches have probably been working hard for the prime event… the least they should have is a proper training facility at ease, and yet someone flopped it needlessly.

And guess what, no heads will roll at the end of the day. We have heard of government wanting to cut off corruption and misconduct… but we have rarely heard of people taking responsibility (or be held responsibility) for the wrong things that they have done.

Update – the Aussies are willing to share the pool, thanks for that.

Mokhzani, who quit Umno on May 21 following in his father and former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s footsteps, had insisted he would hold on to the post as there was no directive from Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad or the Finance Ministry asking him to leave.

SIC is a subsidiary of Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad, which is controlled by the government through Khazanah Holding. [Bernama]

Interesting call, Azalina and Ismail. So, what’s next? All the executive posts of GLCs, government offices, civil services, police force, armed forces blah blah must be hold by Umno members is it?

The reason why we started privatisation of companies is to separate those entities from political influences and to operate at their own in a corporate environment. What’s the point of operating SIC as a corporate if the politicians are going to interfere its operations for political reasons?

Besides, these two Umno fellas might be having their own agenda instead of political frenziness, read more from Rockybru.

The assessment was based on 10 aspects… organisation, technical standards, attendance, governance, marketing and promotion, business scale, match organisation, media, stadiums and clubs. Of the 21 countries (assessed), Malaysia were ranked 18th. [Thestar]

Seems like Malaysian football is sinking deeper and deeper into nowhere. Set the standard of players aside, I can understand that we simply lack the football talent to succeed at the highest level… but what’s the excuse for Malaysia to be disqualified from the competition?

The standard of our football teams is just one of the criteria, the rest are mostly organisational standards. Our footballing bodies from FAM at the top to clubs management at the bottom level should take the blame for this issue. After millions of dollars being spent into the sport, this is certainly not something that Malaysians are hoping for.

Well, pointing fingers is meaningless now… what we need is to find solutions in rebuilding our local league and improving our standard, but FAM clearly have no solid plans that are executable at the moment. Lots of their programs are ad-hoc and not aiming for any long term revival.

From the current development, the future of Malaysian football is not looking good at all.

Malaysian F1 Grand Prix 2008 (Image from MalaysianGP)

Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen claimed this 2008 title, which also saw BMW Sauber’s Robert Kubica finished on the podium… the first podium for the Petronas sponsored team at the ‘home race’.

The 2008 Malaysian F1 might be the last daytime race in Sepang, as race organisers Sepang International Circuit (SIC) is eager to stage their first ever night race as early as 2009, two years ahead of schedule… another kiasu rivalry against Singapore that are going to run the night race in September 2008.

The parodied FAM logo

During the Sportscenter Asia broadcast on Wednesday, ESPN showed a parodied-logo instead of the official FAM logo.

It’s reported by Utusan that the staff from Sportscenter Asia had searched for the logo online and had mistaken that as the official logo.

I couldn’t stop laughing when I saw the ‘logo’ on Jeffrey’s website… how on earth could the ESPN staff mistaken this as the official logo? The parodi-ness is blatantly obvious.

FAM website under construction &
Malaysia web development

FAM website has been under construction for quite some time, and the ESPN staff obviously couldn’t get the logo from an official source. The website would only be back by March 1 according to Azzuddin.

It is a shame that FAM’s website has to be taken down for weeks for reconstruction. This actually exposed a serious issue on how incompetence some web development companies in Malaysia are and how some Malaysian websites are poorly managed.

I don’t count myself as an IT expert, but if I were to handle the FAM’s website reconstruction, the website shouldn’t be down for more than 2 hours; worst case scenario… 48 max. All the contents building and testing should have been done without taking down the site.

I don’t want to bore you with the technicalities… another prime example of poor website management can be seen from the Parliament official website where Chua Soi Lek is still listed as our health minister despite resigning for almost 2 months following his sex scandal.

It is Mew Choo’s first career open title. Her victory is a huge boost to Malaysian women badminton players, as it shows that Malaysian female shuttlers can do as well as the guys.

Hope that Mew Choo will continue to improve her play, and hope that her success would encourage more girls to exile in sports.

FYI, Monsoon Cup is the last stage for this season’s World Match Racing Tour, a Grade 1 event recognized by the International Sailing Federation (ISAF). Although sailing is not popular in Malaysia, the event is not as insignificant as some politicians claimed.

I can remember the criticism about organising F1 in Malaysia prior to the first race in Sepang, but organising the F1 race is probably one of the best decisions Malaysia has made in the 90s. The return is not just the financial gain during the race, but involves global branding which could help attracting foreign visitors (and probably investors) constantly.

The popularity of sailing is probably far behind motor racing, but it does attract a special niche of people, and the impact of the Monsoon Cup should not be taken lightly. Thousands of foreigners will be flocking to Terengganu, and the event will be covered by foreign press and shown in popular sport channels like Sky Sports, Eurosport and ESPN etc. It does put Malaysia on the global map for good reasons.

Is it worth spending RM300 million for Monsoon Cup?

The arguments however, are on the cost of organising the event, and how the money was spent. It’s said that the event would cost RM250-300 million, funded by Wang Ehsan i.e. the royalty from oil and gas for the state of Terengganu. [Read more from MP Kit and MP Ronnie]

RM300 million might be worthwhile investment for Monsoon Cup if the fund is spent at the right places, but the biggest problem with government funding issues is the lack of transparency… Malaysians are constantly kept in the dark on how the money was spent, thus speculation about possible corruption is inevitable.

- Does the RM300 mil involved the building of public infrastructure, or does most of it went into the pocket of the organizers and some rich and (in)famous?

- How the organiser is profiting from the event? Does the organiser have to face any financial risks running the event or that they are guaranteed to make money from the government funding?

- What’s the backing behind government’s decision to release the fund? Was personal relationship involved (hint: KJ, son-in-law of Badawi)? Was there any proper research to backup the proposal of organising the event?

Many questions will remain unanswered. Yes to Monsoon Cup… but nay to government’s fund management.

The games are part of Malaysia’s 50th Merdeka celebration.

Federer will play Sampras on Nov 22, while Nadal vs Gasquet on Nov 20; both matches will be held in Melawati Stadium, Shah Alam. The tickets’ price is ranged from RM83-RM443.

It is Malaysia’s best achievement in this Asian-level tournament since 1994 when they finished third in Hiroshima, Japan. [Bernama]

Malaysians often criticized our sport teams when we are doing poorly, but are stingy in praises when we are doing well… we need to change this mindset, really.

Congratulations to our men hockey team. Work hard and continue achieving good success.

Tengku Abdullah did not give any reason for his resignation; Bernama thinks that his decision to quit from all posts in FAM is seen as his reaction to fulfil the requests of football fans that the present FAM leadership make way for new blood who could bring changes to the local football scene. [Bernama]

I actually think that Tengku Abdullah should resign much earlier; his reign at FAM was not working well obviously. I don’t really blame him though… he is not solely responsible for the slump of our nation football. In fact his apology to the fans on Wednesday after the China defeat has earned some respect from me.

The troubling thing with Malaysian football these days is that nobody has a real clue on what is happening and what can be done to turn back the tide. The fans and critics could only slam the players and the management for the poor performances, but nobody seems capable to come out with a solid plan to revitalise Malaysian soccer.

I can only hope that a real capable person with the right vision and capability will take over Tengku Abdullah’s position.

Publicity

I have read an article from a foreign journalist about his (I assumed) experience in KL… he mentioned that he saw lots of billboards everywhere in the city, but saw nothing about the Asian Cup; he had a feeling that he was at the wrong city for the games… I guess some Malaysians shared the same sentiment too, I know I do.

I can’t recall the organizer taking aggressive methods in pulling the crowd and selling the tickets, or to promote the event. I felt that the Malaysian organizers are taking the event too lightly… for goodness sake, it is one of the largest sporting event in Asia, the world (or at least lots of Asians) are watching the competition; it is a good chance to show how good we are in hosting a major sporting event, or how bad instead.

The Crowd

I think there was around 30,000 people in the stadium watching the game; not really a proud figure (couldn’t fill half of the stadium), but still better than what I expected.

Most of the crowd were well behaved, kudos for that… there were some crooks who threw water bottles to the field though, luckily no one was hurt.

One thing that I think Malaysians need to learn is to respect other’s national anthem. It’s fine to jeer, boo or even curse the opponent during the match… but when a national anthem is played, we should at least have the courtesy to keep quiet.

The Match

Malaysia is thrashed, as expected. I was hoping that they could keep the deficit to 2 goals, but our national team ended losing 1-5 instead. I am not too disappointed though… I kinda accepted the fact that Malaysian football is in a pathetic stage in recent years.

Most of the other fans didn’t share my thinking obviously… there was a point that some Malaysian supporters chanted “China, China” and cheered for the opposition instead. You could imagine how frustrated they were with our players to push them into supporting the opposition.

Luckily we managed to get a consolation goal, the crowd celebrated as if we won the match… Malaysians are easily pleased aren’t we?

[Visit my personal blog to see some photos (14 images) of the event and other extras]

The AFC Asian Cup 2007 has kicked off! This is probably the first ever major sporting event around the world to be co-hosted by 4 countries (Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam)… the first match in Malaysia will be held on Tuesday (July 10) at Bukit Jalil Stadium, with Malaysia playing against China.

I felt that the publicity for the event is quite poor in Malaysia; I don’t see many banners around the city, and I don’t see many advertisements about the tournament on TV or newspapers. Hopefully the stadium won’t be too empty during the matches.

Below is the schedule of the matches (in Malaysia)…

July 10 (2035) – Malaysia vs China (Bukit Jalil)
July 11 (1820) – Iran vs Uzbekistan (Bukit Jalil)
July 14 (1820) – Malaysia vs Uzbekistan (Bukit Jalil)
July 15 (1820) – China vs Iran (Bukit Jalil)
July 18 (2035) – Malaysia vs Iran (Bukit Jalil)
July 18 (2035) – China vs Uzbekistan (Shah Alam)

July 22 (1820) – Quarter final (Bukit Jalil)
July 25 (1820) – Semi final (Bukit Jalil)

Try going for a game a two if possible and show some support for our team and to show our hospitality as a host for the game.