What did Nghe An fans in Malaysia say before the match against Vietnam?
(Baonghean.vn) - "Watching the Malaysian national team play in recent matches, I see that they have a squad of 7 players, who are rarely substituted. Mr. Tan only changes 4 positions in the attack line when he needs to change the attack plan", a fan from Nghe An who is doing business and living in the capital Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) shared with us.
Malaysia is known as “Asia in miniature”, a melting pot of many Asian cultures. According to data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM), from 1990 to 2017, more than 2.8 million people migrated from Vietnam to foreign countries.
Among them, Malaysia is the country with the highest number of Vietnamese people settling here with 85,000 people, just behind the famous names such as: America, Australia, Canada, France, Korea, Germany. There are quite a lot of Nghe An people living and working in Malaysia, many of them join the SLNA Supporters Club here and often read news of their homeland through Nghe An newspaper, they quite like the Sports section.
Some changes
“Nghe An Newspaper has had a very detailed analysis of the strength of naturalized player Shahrel (13) but he just suffered a groin injury and cannot play in the friendly match with Sri Lanka,” said a fan named Minh from Kuala Lumpur.
According to Mr. Minh: “32-year-old center-back Aidil Zafuan wore his familiar number 7 shirt to pair with Shahrul Saad (number 3) in the friendly match with Sri Lanka, but in my opinion, Mr. Tan Cheng-Hoe will still use a defense line consisting of center-back pair Adam Nor Azlin (5) and Shahrul Saad (number 3). The two wings will be number 2 right-back Matthew Davies and number 6 left-back La'Vere Corbin-Ong, of course the goalkeeper will still be Farizal Marlias.”
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| Malaysia's starting lineup for the friendly match against Sri Lanka. Photo: FAM |
According to Mr. Minh, the two central midfielders have been Brendan Gan (at that time wearing the number 6 shirt) and Azam Azih (number 8), but observing the training sessions, this number 8 is also injured. According to SLNA fans in Kuala Lumpur, left midfielder Safawi Rasid (number 11) is the 7th player, who has been in the starting lineup in the last 3 matches of the Malaysian team. "Leading Tiger" Norshahrul Idlan Talaha is the center forward in the 4-2-3-1 formation, but this number 9 is only physically fit enough to play for about 60 minutes.
Replacing Norshahrul Idlan Talaha is usually Akhyar Rashid (19) or Partiban Janasekaran (15), with the latter replacing Shahrel in the right midfield position and scoring a hat-trick against Sri Lanka in a 6-0 win. The attacking midfielder position is usually No. 20 Syafiq Ahmad or No. 14 Saymer Kutty Abba.
In the Malaysian national team, midfielder Saymer Kutty Abba is a versatile player like Quang Hai of Vietnam, when needed he can move out to play as a winger. He has often replaced naturalized player Mohamadou Sumareh. In addition, number 16 Daniel Amier Norhisham is also occasionally arranged by coach Tan to play as a right midfielder.
Expected starting lineup
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| Naturalized players have made the Malaysian national team much stronger. Photo: FAM |
Thus, there are 2 cases where the chance of entering the field is 50/50, namely naturalized midfielder Mohamadou Sumareh (13) and central midfielder Azam Azih (number 8). The appearance and presence in the starting lineup of 3 naturalized players from Malaysia, including 2 full-backs Matthew Davies, La'Vere Corbin-Ong and "sweeper" Brendan Gan will make the match speed much higher than the 3 previous meetings.