it is exciting, if you give it a chance

IT was a mundane held back match between newly crowned English Premier League champions Manchester United and winners Chelsea in the FA Cup final at the newly renovated Wembly Stadium over the weekend.

Yet, many spoke enthusiastically about the match, which saw Ivory Coast marksman Didier Drogba slotting in the solitary goal of the match.

In fact, just hours earlier, the local football scene was gripped with more drama as the race towards the Malaysian Super League title comes to a boiling point.

Kedah currently leads the standings with 42 points with Perak trailing closely behind, just two points shy.

Yes, we also have the surprise of the season in Brunei's club side DPMM FC which ought to finish in the top five bracket thanks to current top scorer and possible golden boot winner Shahrazain Said.

The attendance at the Wembly Stadium was full. In Germany, thousands of fans celebrated as VfB Stuttgart were named the Bundesliga champions of the season. Back home, it would be a joy to even see the stadium half full in the city stadiums.

Nevertheless it must be noted teams up north are blessed with support from their home crowd as stadiums are often packed with enthusiastic fans.

People question the standards, yet how many actually sit through the whole 90 minutes? Perak, under the guidance of Englishman Steve Darby, delievers good football and so does Azraai Khor Abdullah's charges (Kedah).

Followers would agree this has been a rather interesting season in the local league. From UPB-MyTeam's interesting debut in the Premier League to the battle of northern supremacy in the Super League, it has been a rather exciting run.

The FA of Malaysia have made several blunders along the way, more importantly in the scheduling of the matches. They are now again in hot soup, this time in referance to the antics of Manchester United's tour to the region and by Price Group Ltd, the organisers of the very expensive Champions Youth Cup tournament, in suing FIFA.

National youth coach B.Sathianathan insisted, Malaysian standards are that of the SEA Games, while several veteran writers and officials believce it is high time to get in foriegners to don the Malaysian jersey.

Leaving the national team aside, the local league has much to offer. Instead of just supporting foriegn clubs, why not add a local team into the menu?

Local clubs only rely on a trickle of foriegn talents, instead of certain outside teams which their first eleven are stars all over the world. Thus it comes to no surprise why England has only won the World Cup once (1966) thus far.

Some may argue at least England are regulars in the World Cup unlike Malaysia. So are we now prefering foreign establishments then those of our own?

Old fashion perhaps, but nationality starts by supporting the local scene. Whether its football or music, it must be Malaysia first, everything else second.

Too bad there will only be a few of us who actually stand to such an opinion while the rest will still go on to be the slaves of such foriegn entities.

Pic: Perak's Keita Mandjou (yellow) battling it out with Selangor's Mohd Nasriq Baharom at the Perak Stadium in Ipoh earlier this month. -courtesy of tmfootballchannel.com

For more updates on the local football scene, visit www.fam.org.my or www.tmfootballchannel.com

-The Man Who Sold The World-