World Cup citizens?

FAM’s move to hire naturalised players is fine, but it needs to put more thinking into it

WHEN France won the World Cup last year, many around the globe thought Africa deserved the cup. They weren’t entirely wrong. The French national team had more African players than it had French footballers in the national team. To be fair, France wasn’t the only country to have fielded foreign-born players. According to the National Geographic, 97 foreign players played for 32 countries in the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia. Malaysia is heading in the direction of France and many other countries, if FAM’s announcement of the mechanism to get naturalised players is anything to go by. There is nothing wrong in travelling this path. Because we have done it before, though not in very effective ways. We have had naturalised athletes and rugby players. And footballers too as can be gleaned from the New Straits Times report yesterday. But most do not stay long enough to get the locals to emulate them.

There is a reason for this. We are masters at adhocism, having developed a style that is averse to planning. We tend towards the urgent, not the important. If not in other matters national, at least in sports, we are very skilled in “fire-fighting” . Not for us this long-range planning and goal setting, those manning the national sports bodies seem to be saying. Adhocracy rules! And when adhocracy rules, we get disparate parts that don’t assemble into a healthy whole. Just like what the FAM is trying to do. It is all a knee-jerk reaction to a problem that is decades old. FAM has had all the time to come out with a longrange plan to solve the dearth of trophies at international levels, let alone at World Cup level. We repeat what we wrote yesterday: Malaysia has struggled at the international level for the past 40 years. FAM should know this.

But not all is lost, though. FAM can do three things that can help improve the lot of the Harimau. Firstly, it should start at home. Our Malaysian rugby team has been doing rather well since going the naturalised players route 15 years ago. With eight foreign-born players — seven Fijians and one Samoan — our rugby team has taken Malaysia all the way from 76 in 2014 to 46 in 2018 in world rugby ranking. This is an impressive climb that FAM would do well to emulate. Lee Nyuk Fah, former national head coach, credits the foreign-born players for helping Malaysia make the 30-rung leap in just four years.

Secondly, FAM may want to rethink about engaging naturalised footballers aged 18 and above, short term or otherwise. A better strategy is to recruit foreign-born footballers who are 18 and below so that our local players can have the years they need to learn from the imported talents. Even here, FAM may want to engage only three players for a start — a striker, a midfielder and a defender — three vital positions that Malaysia can build up from. Starting with those who are aged below 18 enables Malaysia to have a five-year plan to bring to fruition. Anyone older, leaves Malaysia very little to work on. This way we are assured of nurturing eagles, not turkeys.

We tend towards the urgent, not the important.