My inspiration: Junior Eldstal and his baby daughter. — Pic from Instagram
KUALA TERENGGANU: National defender Junior Eldstal has a new reason for wanting to do his best for his club and national team – his four-month-old baby daughter.
Even though he has loved football since he was a child, the Johor Darul Ta’zim (JDT) player said the birth of his daughter has inspired him to do his best.
“Now I have a baby girl who’s four months old, she’s my motivation, so she can see her daddy at the stadium.
“I love football, and I’m happy to play for the country and my club, I do love the fans and everything about the game and that’s why I wanted to be a professional footballer.
“That’s what I dreamt of doing when I was a kid and that’s my motivation every day,” said the Malaysian-Swede.
Junior is one of the 27 players called up for the Tier 1 friendly matches against the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea.
He did not play in Malaysia’s 4-1 win against the Solomon Islands but is expected to be fielded against Papua New Guinea tomorrow at the Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin Stadium in Kuala Nerus as defender Mohd Feroz Baharudin is unavailable due to injury.
Junior, who was on loan to Thai club PT Prachuap previously, was reported to have been treated unfairly and had a difficult time during his time there.
He made three appearances with the club.
“I don’t want to dwell much about the loan and what happened there, I knew I had a chance to be called back to JDT, so I worked on my fitness on and off the field,” he said.
Junior has 16 caps for Malaysia since his first a decade ago. — Bernama
