True warriors: The Malaysian players and officials team posing for a photograph after the match against South Korea. — AFP
PETALING JAYA: The RM5mil grant is only for the development of football, and not for Football Association of Malaysia’s (FAM) operational costs, says Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh.
Hannah clarified this after the announcement made by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim that the government would give RM5mil to the FAM to manage the national team and matters under their purview.
Anwar said the allocation was in recognition of the strong fighting spirit shown by Harimau Malaya in the 2023 Asian Cup especially after holding South Korea 3-3 in the final Asian Cup Group E game at the Al-Janoub Stadium on Thursday.
“It can’t be used for FAM operational costs. For example, they cannot use it to pay the salaries of staff and other expenses. It is only for football development,” said Hannah.
“It will be monitored by the Finance Ministry,” she added.
“We know Harimau Malaya and the teams under the purview of FAM need a lot of allocation to get better training exposure and we want them to get towards the standard of top nations. So they need funding and the government will help them.
“We can see in the last two years, there have been improvements under coach Kim Pan-gon and we also can see Datuk Hamidin (Mohd Amin, FAM president) doing a lot to get the team going by getting funds.
“Compared to Jordan, Bahrain and South Korea, Malaysia have the lowest funding. It’s hard to look for funds, so we want to help a little bit.
“Before this, FAM got some grants from the Finance Ministry. Last year they didn’t get it. We know Harimau Malaya have the talent to move forward, hence the government is giving the money.”
Hannah also urged the media and the fans to be patient when it comes to development instead of urging sudden coaching or management changes when a team don’t fare well in tournaments. Some had questioned coach Kim Pan-gon’s credentials after losing to Bahrain 0-1 and Jordan 0-4 in the first two Group E games of the Asian Cup and even urged FAM to consider his position.
“Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. What I want to tell the media and the fans is that we should not always demand change in management all the time when we lose. Improvements will take time.
“We have to understand the ecosystem they are in and the challenges they face. You can’t cook up things in a month.”
