Wednesday 23 January 2013

MALAYSIAN FOOTBALL LEAGUE.. IS IT PROFESSIONAL ENOUGH?

Last night, I attended a Super League match between PKNS Selangor and Johor DT at Stadium Shah Alam.  It was an entertaining match.. opportunity to watch Guiza’s skills ‘live’, plenty of goals, and Johor DT won.. Yeah!! (I was born in Johor J ) 

But what actually caught my attention was that there were less than hundred PKNS fans at the stadium, outnumbered 20 times by Johor DT’s fans, and this was supposed to be PKNS home ground.  It made me thinking.. how can PKNS survive financially with this small number of fans?

Let us take a look at professional football clubs in Europe.  Their main sources of revenues come from gate revenues (attendance to home games), sponsorships, and rights/ royalties from clubs’ merchandise.  All these revenues require core fan base.  A club need supporters to attend its home matches and buy its merchandise while sponsors will only come forward if the club have supporters that watch the team play.. it is simple marketing rule.  So, how can a team like PKNS survive in the long-run if only 100 fans turn up for a home match?  Malaysian football turned professional in 2004 and after nearly 10 years, we still have clubs with no supporters playing in Super League.

Other than state or state-linked teams (T-Team and Johor DT), there are 9 clubs in the Super and Premier League with no or limited fan base.  All these clubs need to have wider fan base if they want to be a successful professional football club.  For example, ATM cannot expect to have only soldiers as its fan base and playing at Paroi this year for its home games, far from its fan base, make it worse.  They could use for example Sungai Besi as their home base, make football fans in Sungai Besi and surrounding area feels ATM is their team, and play their home games in KLFA Stadium in Cheras, which is nearby.  In some cases, re-branding might be necessary.  For example, Sime Darby FC can re-brand itself to Sime Subang Jaya to expand its fan base from only Sime Darby employees to include Subang Jaya community (or any other location).

Relocation can also be made to create a new fan base.  We are a football mad country and there are many locations in the country that can be made a home base for a professional football club.  It does not make any economic sense to have 8 football teams with home base in Klang Valley.  Most of these teams are competing with Selangor that already have strong and loyal fan base.  Temerloh can be a good home base for Felda United for example.  Pahang have some of their matches in Temerloh last year with good crowd.  I am quite sure football fans in Temerloh will appreciate regular high level football matches and support a team that is based there.

A professional football club is supposed to be profit-oriented.  Therefore, it needs to attract the crowds to generate income.  Without strong fan base, I am quite sure most of these clubs suffer operating loss every year.  To cover for that loss, they need grant from FAM or cash injection from their owners.  Since majority of owners are public entities, I suspect public money are used to finance these clubs (yup.. our taxpayers money).  Professional league means having professional clubs/ teams, not just having professional players.  So FAM, please make sure there are only professional clubs/ teams in our league before calling our M-League a professional league.

Wednesday 16 January 2013

LISTEN!! RESPECT others' opinions and THINK!!..

I haven’t had the time to write in my blog in the past few months, but events in the past few days make me have to write this.  It seems that many of us in this country have forgotten how to respect other people’s opinions.

To start with, I want to express my sympathy to my fellow economist Azrul Azwar.  He presented his forecast of 3 scenarios for the forthcoming PRU13 and their impact to Malaysian economy including scenarios where PR would win it.  Surprise surprise.. he got suspended by his employer Bank Islam for “serious misconduct”.  Ok.. his forecast is not in line with Bank Islam’s “official view” but Bank Islam did come out with this statement “The views expressed by Mr Azrul are not entirely his personal view and should not be linked or attributed to Bank Islam whatsoever.”  If that is the case, then why suspend him? 

What I find even funnier is the remark made by Deputy Finance Minister Awang Adek Hussin “.. he should not be talking about politics..”.  Dear Sir, do you really know what an economist job is?  An economist has to come up with economics forecasts taking into account all variables including politics.  I am quite sure Tan Sri Zeti is offended with such remark.  Actually I am not surprise by the Deputy Minister remark, I had experience working as economist in government environment for 8 years and I dare say most of the people “up there” don’t know what the scope for an economist is.

What concerns me most is the attack by pro-government blogs on Azrul’s professional views.  Noted that he is a PKR member, so his views might be biased towards PR.. but to attack his credibility as a seasoned economist is below the belt, guys.  If you don’t agree with him, come up with facts why his scenarios were wrong.  If you attack him just because he is a PR member, then the same can be said to other professionals out there who are UMNO, MIC or MCA members.. all their opinions are worthless.  So, whose views can we listen then?

This brings me to the event in UUM that went viral in the net for the past few days.. “LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.. “.  This incident exposes the classic case lacking respect for others’ opinions.  For Sharifah Zohra to cut Bawani from continue giving her opinions (by pulling the mic, can you believe it?) was without ‘adab’.  Then, telling Bawani should LISTEN to her because she is older and belittling Bawani as having the least education among the students there just because Bawani has different opinions from her.. well, make me have no RESPECT to her.  Sharifah.. I hear more facts from Bawani than you in that 10 minutes incident.

What happened in UUM actually represent what is happening in this country lately especially with PRU around the corner.  Everybody is categorised as either BN or PR supporters and thus, all opinions are considered bias without looking at the supporting arguments.  If I say BR1M is good, people will say I am a BN supporter.  If I say free education is possible, people will say I am a PR supporter.  What if I say both.. I guess I am not a Malaysian then because Malaysian should be either BN or PR.. SERIOUSLY??

LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.. is a virus that if left unchecked will leave our society divided and unable to think.  Why should we be surprise Bawani was treated that way when a Chief Economist was treated the same way?  Granted that both gave opinions that favoured PR, but are we too brain-dead to absorb the arguments given and counter them with our own arguments with facts?  If we can’t counter them but don’t agree with them.. show our respect, sit quite and shut our mouth because the moment our mouth opens, stupidity will come out.  Think about it.  Instead of LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.. LISTEN!.., we should be actually THINK!.. THINK!.. THINK!