World Cup 2014: an Almost Impossible Dream

Last night our national  football team was beaten by the Qatar team with a score of 2-3.

Playing in front of an audience of 28,000 at the GBK Stadium in Jakarta, our team, spearheaded by striker Cristian Gonzalez who made the two goals, didn't show their best performance, while the Qatar team played very well.

With this result, our team's chance to win the Asian qualification for the World Cup 2014 became very slim. It has to win three other matches against Qatar (11 Nov), Iran (20 Nov) and Bahrain (Feb 2012).

Frankly speaking, I am not really surprised with the result of above match. It is not that I doubt the capability of our team's players, but I am very disappointed with the management of  football in this country.

I don't know much about football but I felt that the change of chairman of the football association (PSSI) several months ago followed by the improper changing of coaches failed to improve performance quality of the team.

Football and Nationalism

 On 14 July1969, a Football War broke out between two Central American countries i.e El Salvador and Honduras.

The war (ended on 18 July 1969) was caused by political tensions between both countries that coincides with inflamed rioting between fans of their football teams during the second North American qualifying round for the 1970 FIFA World Cup. For details on the Football War, please click here.

This Football War shows that a Football match is not just an ordinary sport match but it can also be a competition between national prides of the countries competing in the matches.

This is quite obvious because unlike other sports e.g Badminton, Tennis, Athletics, which rely on individual skills of the player, in Football, a player must not only be good playing by himself, but he must also be good playing with ten other members of his team.

Most countries have their national football teams with members consisting of best players in their country, to compete against other country's national teams.

Like in other countries, football in Indonesia is played by men from all walks of life almost every time there is a celebration, that is why Football is often described as the People's Sport.
But until the recently, the condition of football here was actually not good whereby our team loose many times against other countries.

But all that has changed after the Indonesian national team won all five matches in the qualifying round of the 2010 AFF-Suzuki Cup. Therefore, many people who never enjoy watching football matches before, like children, ladies, famous celebrities, have became supporters of our team. Every day all the news media reported about our national team players, their private lives etc.

Tickets for the 85,000 seats of the main stadium in Jakarta have been sold-out during the last several games

Our national team's fans are so fanatic that they are willing to travel to Kuala Lumpur where our national team will meet Malaysia in the First leg of Final Round tonight, whereby 15,500 tickets allocated for fans of our team have been sold-out.

For the last several days, they have been willing queue for many hours to buy tickets for the second leg which will held in Jakarta on 29 December 2010. This is amazing considering that the prices of tickets are very high i.e. between 50,000 Rupiah (US$ 5+) and 1 million Rupiah (US$ 100+), compared to the prices of tickets in Malaysia i.e. RM 30 (87,000 Rupiah) and RM 50 (144,500 Rupiah). For details on the Tickets, please click here.

I am very happy with this rising nationalism among our people in supporting our national team. I hope that our leaders in the government, parliament and judiciary bodies would be able to use this momentum to gain support for development programs that benefits our country and people.


Logo : Courtesy of AFF-Suzuki Cup.

McMenemy and Rahma Azhari

Two days have passed since the Indonesian football team beats the Philippines a.k.a Azkals 1-0 in the Semi Final of the Asean Football Federation (AFF) Suzuki Tournament last Sunday, but the news media in both countries are still discussing about match.

While our media focused on final matches versus Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur on 26 December, and Jakarta on 29 December, Filipino media discussed about their team's failure, and relationship between their British coach Simon McMenemy and Indonesian actress Rahma Azhari after the match in Jakarta                  

Please find below an article quoted from the Filipino media ABS-CBN News.

Indonesian actress gets cozy with Azkals coach

By Jojo Malig, abs-cbnNEWS.com

Posted at 12/21/2010 12:56 AM | Updated as of 12/21/2010 11:32 AM

MANILA, Philippines – Who is Rahma Azhari?

Google her name and head to the images section. Satisfied?

Now imagine her in the arms of the Philippine Azkals’ British coach Simon McMenemy.

Wait, don’t imagine anymore. 

Azhari has already uploaded a photo of her and McMenemy together during a party in Jakarta. 

“Hhhmm goodbye simon, have a nice trip back to manila xoxo,” the Indonesian actress said in her Twitter account. 

The Jakarta Post believes that the pictures were taken at a nightclub in Jakarta after the Azkals’ AFF Suzuki Cup semifinal match against Indonesia on Sunday.

“He's just a friend... What a lovely person... Glad to actually met him! Had a great time!” Azhari tweeted. 

“Yes that’s him... McMenemy feverrr... :))," she added.

The 29-year-old Azhari, who is also a model for men’s magazines, is a magnet for controversy, according to Indonesian media.

She made the headlines in the world’s most populous Muslim country in November 2008 after naked pictures of her and her sister, Sarah Azhari, made rounds on the Internet.

Other photographs of her with men in compromising positions are also shown online in various Indonesian blogs.  The 32-year-old McMenemy was unavailable for comment.

Two Azkals players, brothers James and Phil Younghusband, earlier set female Indonesian Twitter users on fire. 

While their national team was busy playing against the Philippines, Indonesian girls were swooning on the Internet over the Younghusbands.

“I fall in love with nomer 10 philpin #younghusband,” said @flegong, highlighting her post with hashtags to be read by more users of the microblogging service.

Even Indonesian men were bitten by the Younghusband bug. 

“#TimnasIndonesia #TimnasIndonesia #TimnasIndonesia Bonus #Younghusband,” said Agus Siswoyo.

Indonesia vs Philippines 1-0 again!

Indonesian football striker Cristian Gonzales once again show his ability when he made the only goal in the second leg of the match between Indonesia and the Philippines in the AFF-Suzuki Cup tournament in Jakarta.

This goal was made at the 43rd minutes of the first half of the match. With this victory, the Indonesian team will go to the final and play versus Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur on 26 December (1st. leg) and Jakarta on 29 December (2nd. leg).

A big thank you and congratulations to our national team and coaches lead by Alfred Riedl. I hope that they would do their very best to improve the team's weaknesses, especially coordination between goal keeper Markus Horison and the other players.

One thing that amazed me was that our team's 5 victories, against Malaysia, Laos, Thailand, Philippines (2x) have unified the Indonesian people who gave their support enthusiastically, which can be seen from the large audience at the stadium, 80,000 in the last two matches, quite peacefully.

Photo our national team :  Courtesy of The Jakarta Globe

Garuda and the National Football Team

I thought that everyone in Indonesia are happy that our national football team beats Malaysia, Laos and Thailand in the AFF-Suzuki Cup, and will play versus the Philippines in the Semi Final in Jakarta on Thursday.

That's why I was surprised when I read on the blog of ReBorn yesterday about the Lawsuit filed by David Tobing, a lawyer, against the used of the Garuda Symbol on the T-Shirts of the our national team.

In an interview with TVOne last night, David Tobing said that afternoon he has filed the Lawsuit with the District Court of Central Jakarta against the President, the Education Minister, the Sports and Youth Minister, the All Indonesian Football Association (PSSI) and PT Nike Indonesia.

He alleged that the use of the Garuda symbol on the T-Shirts is against the Law No 24/2009 Article 57 regarding the use of State Symbols.

This allegation was denied by the other guest at the talk show i.e. Historian Asvi Warman Adam who said that Article 52 of said Law allow the use of a State Symbol among others for those who are representing the country. He also said that our national football team has also used the Garuda symbol when they played against the Soviet Union at the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956.
These statement was supported by lawyer Amir Syamsuddin who also urged David Tobing not to take advantage of the national team's present popularity.

Considering that our national team has been doing their best to represent our country in the AFF-Suzuki Cup, and we expect that they will win the tournament, I hope that David Tobing would be wise and withdraw the lawsuit, especially that now that the public has know about him and his protest. And if he persists, I hope that the judges would refuse his lawsuit. 


Sources :
-  Garuda di Seragam Timnas PSSI Menuai Gugatan (Hukumonline)
-  Lambang Garuda di kostum Timnas Digugat (MetroTV)
-  Kemendiknas Diskusikan gugatan lambang Garuda di kaos Timnas (Primaironline) 

Photo :  Courtesy of Kaskus.