The ball keeps on rolling

JUST when you think it is safe to get back to bed, reality hits home when you read the back pages – the sports news. There, staring at you is news that there is even more life left after all that ball-bashing in Brasil.

As the whole world waited with bated breath for the final match of World Cup 2014, the FAM (Football Association of Malaysia) held its draw for the Malaysia Cup.

The what Cup, you might well ask? You read it right the first time round – the Malaysia Cup.

Even if you are the ultimate ignoramus in the company of non-comprehending football philistines, you must have heard of Mokhtar Dahari, Santokh Singh, R Arumugam or Soh Chin Aun. These are big names from the past annals of Malaysian football. Both Mokhtar (Super Mokh) and gangly keeper Aru (aka Spiderman) have passed on to the great football field in the sky but in their day, our football team were heaped with praise, not derision.

Mokhtar Dahari’s skill shone like a beacon in the celebrated friendly with Arsenal in 1978. The Gunners,which came this way on their summer tour – yes, this is not s totally new phenomena – were beaten in this friendly, brought down by two goals from Mokhtar the man.

Far from building on this fantastic feat, our football regressed. Each time the Fifa rankings come up, we do make it; but in the high 100s. Other less hallowed teams whose economy lack any steam to even feed their populace somehow figure higher in the list.

Malaysian football at its highest level is pompously known as the Super League – our version of the Barclays Premier League (BPL). Rather a logical choice as the best has to be – SUPER; right?

Not until you look one rung lower for the second-tier tournament, which is confusingly named; the Premier League. Premier, when translated into Bahasa Malaysia becomes Perdana, a term that carries with it the ultimate political connection with the nation’s leader. The Prime Minister is, in the local language Perdana Menteri (when in actual fact Menteri Perdana sounds more accurate, but that is for debate in a different forum). One would not be entirely wrong then, to assume that anything that is top drawer stuff should be Premier and therefore Perdana. But by decree the powers that be agree that Super is better than Premier. Lower down, there is a third tier of competition, called the FAM league involving 22 club teams.

Even further down in fourth are the State leagues organised within their confined borders. All 14 States organise their respective leagues, which comprise from eight to 10 teams each – the bigger the State, the more the number of teams participating.

All rather confusing to quite a large section of the football fan fraternity. The following is lukewarm at best, especially among the more well-heeled city types. These are viewers who are rather more well-schooled in the ins and outs of teams and players who play the game in the far, far, more organised and exciting professional English or European leagues.

This brings us back to the Malaysia Cup. This competition will only kick off once all the matches on the Malaysian football league calendar is completed. Teams that performed well in the league proceed to contest the Malaysia Cup. The matches this year are played with a break after the group matches are start beginning August. This is to enable the national team to be assembled and participate in tournaments that the country has committed itself.

The FAM hopes a bit of the shine from the action in Brasil 2014 will rub on the competition. We may not have action and drama of the scale seen in the Maracana, but the action can be just as vigorous if not explosive and at times incendiary.

Malaysian fans are ready to embrace Cup football. But faced as we are by intrigue and machinations that colour if not mar our football landscape, we will have to settle with watching other nations battle it out for the crown of football champions in more foreseeable World Cups to come.