The Good, The Bad & The Sad Of Harimau Malaya & Muda's 2019

Credit: FAM

2019 turned out to be a rather eventful year of us when it comes to international football. Every fan got together to either celebrate important victories, drowning in sorrow over losing results or angry at a few circumstances. We take a look back at the good, the bad and the sad of our national team across all age levels.

The Good

The Double Over Indonesia

This one was rather obvious, isn’t it? There is nothing more satisfying than getting a win over rivals, even more so than doing a double over them. In July, Malaysia & Indonesia were drawn in the same group for the World Cup/Asia Cup qualifying by Australian legend Tim Cahill that surely brought out a sense of awe, excitement and/or giddiness from both countries.

In the end, it was Malaysia who got the better of Indonesia over both qualification fixtures. Mohamadou Sumareh was the hero at Jakarta on the opening fixture scoring a brace, including a last-minute winner in an absolute classic in September winning 3-2. Then in the reverse fixture, it was Safawi Rasid’s turn to take the spotlight as his brace lead Malaysia to a 2-0 win at Bukit Jalil to end the senior international year on a high.

AFC U-19 Qualification

Brad Maloney had two big tasks to lead the U-18 charges in his new job and it was the second one that proved to be much more fruitful than his first (In which we will go into later). His task here was to get the U-19 squad into the 2020 AFC U-19 Championship held in October next year at Uzbekistan. And they did so impressively.

However, they had an extremely nervy start when they won 5-4, where they got two players sent off within seconds while in cruise control at 3-0. They then carved out big wins over Brunei (11-0) and Northern Mariana Islands (10-0) before condemning Thailand to a 1-0 defeat on the final matchday to not only finish as group winners to seal qualification, but also sending Thailand out of the running as well.

An Impressive Record

Malaysia began 2019 at 168 in the FIFA rankings. Playing in 13 official matches, Malaysia has won nine of them and lost four. Notable victories include slim victories of higher ranked Afghanistan (2-1), Tajikistan (1-0) in friendlies and Thailand (2-1) in a crucial World Cup/Asia Cup qualifying match. 

Along with qualifying matches carrying more weightage, it helped propel the Harimau Malaya ending the year in 154th, climbing 14 spots in the process, showing great results in the rebuild of the team under Tan Cheng Hoe. Though the defeats, especially against Vietnam & UAE, had served us as a reminder there is still work to be done.

The Bad

Drowned At The SEA Games 

Where to begin on this one? With so many capable names in the team including establish internationals and the impending debuts of Luqman Hakim Shamsudin and Umar Hakeem, you would think the team can do just enough to get out of Group A when compared who is in Group B. But everything went incredibly wrong for the U-23 team.

An opening 1-1 draw against Myanmar was followed up by a terrible match against host nation Philippines, losing 1-0. Malaysia regained some pride against Timor Leste 4-0, but their SEA Games campaign ended disastrously by losing 3-1 to Cambodia in a must-win match on the final group day. Mind you, this was almost the same squad that also pushed China all the way earlier in the year using the same set-up. Perhaps a lack of preparation time and the season ending contributed to this letdown. The only positives from this tournament was the emergence of Hadi Fayyadh and perhaps Quentin Cheng’s first goal for the Malaysia even if it was only a consolation against Cambodia. 

However, it ultimately became Dato’ Ong Kim Swee’s last hurrah as it was confirmed his contract as U-23 head coach will not be renewed. A terrible way for his otherwise bright tenure to end.

Oopsies At The Airmarine Cup

One of the reasons this mini-tournament was made is to get Malaysia’s ranking up by beating much higher opposition to avoid an extra World Cup/Asia Cup qualifying round. Though the reception to this cup was a mix of annoyance and anger due to the expensive ticket prices that resulted in the Ultras boycotting the March international break for just this time.

Still, hopes were high that Malaysia were to reach the finals at least following an impressive 2018 AFF Suzuki Cup campaign. But they started out the year in disaster. A combination of a disjointed midfield and questionable defending allowed Singapore to beat Malaysia by a solitary goal by Faris Ramli, who has recently joined Terengganu.

It was bad enough to be KO’d out of a tournament held in your own home, but it also condemned Malaysia to playing that extra qualifying round in the middle of the year. Though, everything turned out to be Ok in the end with a victory over a much higher ranked Afghanistan in a 3rd place play-off and then the two wins over Timor Leste in that qualifying round got more FIFA ranking points than usual it allowed Malaysia to be in Pot 4 of the World Cup/Asia Cup draw rather than pot 5.

The Sad

U-23’s Shattered Olympic Dreams

This one was difficult to take it in. Despite doing almost everything right, Malaysia still couldn’t book a ticket to the 2020 AFC U-23 Championships and in the process, saw their Olympic hopes ending early. Hosting their group consisting of Philippines, Laos & China; who was lead by legendary manager, Guus Hiddink at the time.

A 3-0 win over Phillipines gave the team a good start, but a frustrating night against V. Sundramoorthy’s Laos only saw Malaysia beat them by only a single goal by Safawi Rasid. With results against last-placed teams not counted to determine the four best runners-up due to Pakistan’s withdrawal, it became a mission to somehow defeat China on the last matchday.

Malaysia was leading 2-1 with six minutes to go, but a jumping header by Jiang Shenglong gave China the much-needed equalizer to see them finis ahead of us due to a better goal difference. As the night went on, it became apparent to some teams in West Asia that all they needed was a draw due to a much better goal difference and it resulted in Malaysia’s Olympic dreams ending in a painful manner after a brave performance that even earned Guus Hiddink’s respect.

The U-16’s Last-Minute Heartbreak

Had the young boys not conceded a despairing last-minute equalizer against Japan of all teams, this part wouldn’t have been written at all. Alas, here we are. If it weren’t for Yamato Naito, Malaysia would’ve finished first in their group ahead of Japan due to head-to-head records.

A thumping 7-0 win over Cambodia gave the young tigers momentum. But they crashed down back to earth in the worst way possible against Laos. A 4th minute goal by Lavi Somthongkam was enough for Laos to beat us where the match also saw poor Alif Farhan Fauzi given a second yellow card that further put the result beyond doubt. That gave Malaysia an almost impossible task to take out Japan on the final matchday, in which they almost did thanks to Danial Edzuan’s brace. But sadly, it wasn’t meant to be.

So Close, Yet So Far At The AFF U-18

The AFF U-18 Championships was Brad Maloney’s first big task to lead the young charges. They got off to a bad start where they conceded an 89th goal straight from a corner to Vietnam. However, a run of good results, including an impressive 3-0 win over Australia, along with other favorable results saw the team to advance into the semi-finals from a very difficult group.

A wild 4-3 win in extra-time over complicated neighbors Indonesia set up a rematch with Australia in the finals. However, Australia were prepared this time and made sure there wasn’t be a repeat as a 79th minute winner by Lachlan Brook was enough to give the Young Socceroos the title.