Malaysia ready to take on giants Iran at Asian meet

KUALA LUMPUR: The match between Malaysia and Iran today is where the real drama begins at the 2018 IBSA Blind Football Asian Championships.

The competition kicked off with a bang yesterday with two actionpacked matches.

The match will be streamed live on the R.AGE Facebook page (fb.com/ thestarRAGE) at 9.30am today, and Malaysia’s captain and star player Mohamad Amirul Arif urged the public to get behind the team.

“The support from our fellow Malaysians will inspire us to keep fighting for the win,” said Mohamad Amirul.

“I hope everyone who’s free will show up for any of our games this week and cheer the boys on.”

The team’s first match, against giants Iran, the 2016 Rio Paralympics silver medallists, will also play a huge role in whether Malaysia makes it to the finals of the 2018 IBSA World Championships – the “World Cup” of blind football.

Iran has beaten Malaysia three times before, and easily dispatched fierce rivals South Korea 3-0 yesterday.

Nevertheless, Malaysia coach Sunny Shalesh is determined to show Iran some true Malaysian fighting spirit.

For Sunny, the match is the culmination of four years of hard work, having guided the team from a small group of amateurs to becoming national athletes and 2015 Asean Para Games gold medallists.

“We will fight like hungry tigers to qualify for the World Cup,” he promised.

Find out more about the Malaysian blind football team’s quest to reach the World Cup through the Eye On The Ball project (fb.com/EyeOnTheBallFilm), a multimedia campaign by R.AGE and CIMB Foundation.