The new Super League season – a day late and a dollar short?

A PENNY saved is a penny earned. Otherwise, a fool and his money are soon parted.

Our athletes, whether they are footballers cashing in from the industry or a diver reliant on monthly wages bankrolled by the National Sports Council (NSC), must learn to be frugal in managing their money earned through hard work.

With limited career life span, athletes realise they need to make hay while the sun shines.

Mohd Zaquan Adha Abdul Radzak, who turns 37 in August, knows his career is nearing its end. He was ready to ride off into the sunset.

But perhaps he was expecting a more respectable exit than a mere letter stating his contract was not renewed by the Negri Sembilan management.

Zaquan, like his elder twin Mohd Aidil Zafuan, has had a fairly-successful 20-year career since helping Negri bag the gold medal in the Malaysia Games (Sukma) in Seremban in 2004.

The attacker who served the country with distinction in spite of a series of injuries, was a key member of Datuk K. Rajagopal’s victorious SEA Games squad in 2009 but missed the AFF Cup in 2010.

Zaquan belongs to a small group of footballers who are paid handsomely. Many are not so lucky.

Despite M-league’s status as one of the most prestigious competitions in this region, we know the game is infested with poor paymasters.

At one time a total of 147 players who had played for five defunct clubs – Perlis, Hanelang FC, Marcerra United, Kuantan FA and Terengganu City – applied for financial assistance from FIFA and FIFPRO through their Fund for Football Players (FFP) initiative.

On the FFP chart, Malaysia were ranked second behind Greece who recorded 291 claims.

When clubs folded, players were left in the lurch, forcing them to fend for themselves.

Now following Malaysian Football League’s club licensing and privatisation move, team owners are now liable to be taken to court, declared bankrupt and could be banned from football for life.

The likes of Melaka and Sarawak United cannot abscond without paying what is due even if they had closed shop.

In Ayer Keroh recently, the High Court heard the case of 17 players from Melaka who are claiming damages for unpaid wages.

In February, the verdict to sentence the owner of Kuantan FA and Marcerra United to seven days in prison was a landmark decision.

Against this backdrop, the Super League remains an attractive option for teams who promise to break the bank but eventually find themselves burning holes in their pockets.

I hope Perlis are not one of them. The club have been asked to meet additional conditions to qualify for the conditional extraordinary licence needed to play as the 14th team in the Super League 2024-2025.

Apart from Perlis, similar applications were submitted by the Immigration FC, KL Rovers FC and Harini Selangor FT to fill the 14th slot after the MFL Club Licensing Appeal Committee (AB) rejected Kelantan’s application for a national licence to compete in the Super League this season.

According to MFL, applications received showed that Perlis possessed stronger documentation with copies of sponsorship letters worth Rm25mil from four potential sponsors, namely Mudim Zakaria Food Industries Sdn Bhd, Ivory Properties Group Berhad, M.A Intelligent Holdings Sdn Bhd and Al Razi Holding (M) Sdn Bhd.

Previously known as KSK Tambun Tulang, Perlis spent most of their existence under the shadows of the more-established Perlis FA who enjoyed the state government’s patronage.

It was in 2018 that a fraudulent investment involving a businessman that Perlis FA, at that time rebranded as Perlis Northern Lions FC, led to the team’s collapse, with unpaid wages amounting to Rm5mil.

Perlis were expelled from the Premier League, the second tier in the previous league structure in 2019.

The Perlis brand that was allowed to play in the M3 League in 2022 was the Perlis United FC, a separate entity from the Perlis FA.

Perlis’s promotion appears imminent, which would mean that the first time since 2011, Malaysia’s smallest and northernmost state will be represented in the top flight.

But the sad thing is, not even MFL can guarantee that Perlis will not be plagued by financial woes two or three years down the road.