From the Shah Alam Stadium Stand Incident: The Power of Ultras Malaysia
Is it a crowd that sees football as an excuse to gather and relieve personal frustrations, or are they truly passionate fans who seek joy from the atmosphere on the field? In the end, do Malaysians love football?
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| The Ultras Malaya group were the ones cheering for the Malaysian team in the match against the Vietnamese team. |
| RELATED NEWS |
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Indifference to football
Kesuma lives just a few steps from Shah Alam Stadium, but his love of football has not been enough to draw him to this “hot pot” in his 27 years of life, before the match on the evening of December 7. This is also the home ground of Selangor FC, currently the runner-up in the Malaysian Premier League, but apart from the recent match, the stadium has rarely been filled to one-sixth of its capacity. Selangor’s average attendance last season was 12,000 people per match.
I asked many Malaysians about the AFF Cup and the semi-final match between Vietnam and Malaysia, but received only lukewarm responses. Ishak, the security guard of the Malaysian Football Federation, who kept gesticulating enthusiastically to “illustrate” his comments about the Vietnamese team (“very fast and technical”), said that he would stay home and watch on… TV.
In an article titled “Malaysian Ultras, Blessing or Curse?” published yesterday, FourFourTwo cited the friendly match between Malaysia and the Philippines at the Selayang Stadium on March 1 this year, a match that, according to the magazine, “changed the culture of fandom in Malaysia forever and ensured that Malaysian Ultras would be a stain on the country’s football scene for years to come.”
From the “30 Minutes of Silence” campaign
The Ultras launched a campaign called “30 minutes of silence” via a Twitter hashtag in response to the 30 years of FAM’s leadership. And in fact, after the match kicked off at 8.45pm, all Malaysian fans stood still like statues for half an hour, before the “show” really began.
The first flare roared into the night sky, followed by six more that lit up the sky. Each flare represented what they thought Malaysian football was: unchanging, only for those in power, resilient, never giving up, sincerity and belief. “We did it because we wanted Malaysia, FAM and the world to know that there was always a meaning behind our actions,” Freddie Arifin, founder of Ultras Malaya’07 (UM07), said. “I was the one who fired the first flare. All we wanted was to give Malaysian football a boost.”
Nine months ago, flares ignited an atmosphere that was both terrifying and exhilarating: the temperature in the stadium rose, smoke bombs appeared and before everyone was a fascinating, primal spectacle. It was the moment when Malaysian fans went from passive supporters to a real power in Malaysian football. FAM even agreed to a compromise with the Ultras groups in Malaysia to ensure that the number of people attending the stadium would be guaranteed for matches involving the national team.
Until the match against Vietnam on the evening of December 7, those Ultras were truly the doping of football. Sitting in a stadium packed with 80,000 people was truly a “hair-raising” experience, especially when the ones who created that tense and stifling atmosphere were Malaysian fans.
But that “drug” does not create true love for football. The “fire pan” of Shah Alam can cool down overnight, when the fans return home and return to their familiar rhythm of life, before another fun draws everyone to the stadium, not necessarily because of the appeal of football, but because of the feeling of releasing the frustration and holding in hand an invisible power that is dominating this football. The terrifying, but also extremely attractive power of the Ultras.
According to TT&VH
Hooligans who beat Vietnamese fans banned from stadium for life
It is known that the thugs causing trouble at Shah Alam Stadium were mainly members of the Inter Johor Firms (IJF) group. This is an extremist and fanatical group of Johor Darul Takzim FC, the home team of striker Safee Sali. This group has caused many violent incidents in the stands, especially in the recent Malaysia Cup final between Johor Darul Takzim and Pahang. According to the Malaysian version of Goal, the attack was pre-planned. At least 20 hooligans (mostly from the IJF group) wore masks and carried weapons into the stadium. It is unclear how they managed to get past the security forces before attacking Vietnamese fans as they celebrated Van Quyet's goal to make it 2-1. The Johor Football Association has decided to ban IJF members from playing at stadiums for life. The ban is not only effective at Tan Sri Dato Haji Hassan Yunos Stadium in Johor but also at any stadium in Malaysia where Johor State teams play. According to bongdaplus |
