"Dalian...Shide...Liaoning"

If you were at Queenstown stadium days ago, you bound to hear the mentioned chants by the "home" fans.

After all, it was the home debut of Dalian Shide Siwu FC (one of the many variations of this team) - the latest addition to the S.League.

Initially, these fans (a small pocket of Chinese expatriates) were chanting "Come On, Dalian!" (大连队,加油!) before they switched to "Come On, Shide!" (实得队,加油!), although the funny part occurred when they also chant "Come on, LIAONING!"(辽宁队,加油!)

No fault to that, since Dalian is a seaport located in the Liaoning province, thus no argument to that I thought (See the map above.. Thanks Paul, for reminding me that).

PICTURES at QUEENSTOWN STADIUM

The first surprise was to read the another variation of the name of the Dalian Shide Football Club - "Dalian Shide Talent Development Football Club' (Wow.. that's long and formal eh..)

Another surprise was to see the media booth being shifted upwards to the top of the stand..

This was where the media booth used to be.. the marking of the legs of the tables being patched up by the cement fillings.

One of the problems at Queenstown Stadium is the obstructing pillars of the main stands, which I told Young Lions' coach V Sundramoorthy that he can't get a good shot with his videocam because of this essential structures.

Even in the middle of the park, the vertical structure is still even the sight..

Brazilian's write-up of S.League

The "PrtSc" shoot of the site...

Got a request for info days ago, just before the kick-off of the season.

A Brazilian journalist was keen to do a write-up for the League and requested for some information.

So I did and not long ago he emailed the link of the story (as mentioned below - the URL)

http://www.trivela.com/Futebol.aspx?secao=7&id=18670

It's in Portuguese though (might need to translate with the in-built software inside the Firefox browser)

The website of "Jaguars Den"

picture link

Came across the website while someone was searching for "Steven Tan" on Google.

"Jaguars Den" was probably one of the first few S.League-related website making its debut in late 1990s.

Sad to note that unavoidable financial crunch had forced this well-supported club out of business years back, but at least fans of the Jags can still relive that memories by log on to this not-longer-update site at http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Loge/8181/

Different kind of football..

Saw this not-your-usual kind of football at "FairPrice Xtra" at AMK HUB

At least, it solves the problem in case the stadium light-out or the urge of having a kick-about in any dark alley..

Simply, because it GLOWS in DARK...

But the problem is it's small in size, suppose to meant for kids eh?? (not fair actually)

Reborn Reds...

(P.S: I decided to take down this entry temporary and re-posted it again on Tuesday (19th) evening,to avoid being perceived as "trying to be faster" than the official league website)

Festive mood greeted those who were at Yishun Stadium before the first match of the new season between Super Reds and Woodlands Wellington.

"Shouldn't this introductory event be done last year during their inaugural year?" I thought when I saw the carnival-styled atmosphere at the Korean-based Super Reds' designated home ground.

A banner (near the Khatib MRT station) announced the match to be played at Yishun stadium.

These ladies were from Korean broadcaster KBS (as I overheard someone was asking them, saw one of them at JBS on Sunday..)

"That's life in Singapore..." as a short video clip was played to the fans that documented the life of the players in Singapore.

Traditional Korean drum performance kicked start the fanfare before the match.

"Here they are!!" as the Super Reds greeted their fans before their warming-up.

The cheerleaders did a good job to arouse the atmosphere and fighting spirit of the team.

Half-time entertainment - a friend was commenting that the Koreans had just set a new benchmark for this 15-minute break segment.

The match in progress, which the Koreans had their game plan well-executed.

Got this namecard from the club president, who tap my shoulder before handed this to me, thanks Sir

Let's see what are the other teams are up to... Stay tuned :)

(P.s: Great performance by the Koreans on and off the pitch)

18th February

That's the date for the kick-off of 2008 S.League season.

Barely (or less than) three months after the concluding of season 2007 (perhaps the shortest recess to date), this season will kicks off with plenty concerns and constraints.

Concern for the fact that the national team will brace themselves against the top Asian teams in the World Cup qualifiers, which will eventually see a large of national players unable to turn out for their employing clubs when the season commences.

As such the top-three (the uniformed duo - SAFFC, Home United and Tampines Rovers) will have to do without their stars players (and fear of getting injured, of course) and rely heavily on their depth.

This is not a bad thing, since it will be a good chance for the fringe players to prove themselves in crunch time like this.

On the other hand, constraint in a sense that with living expenses skyrocketing, another problem will be - Would the fans (or rather the punters) bother to turn at the grounds?

Every penny counts in time like this as everybody try to scale back their expenditure.

Whilst, I am not asking the clubs and league authority to hike or lower the admission but KIV any thoughts on that.

The whole idea is at $5 per adult (except for Albirex at 6 bucks, as I was told) and $1 for school children, not to forget the occasionally "FOC" admission to "Friday Night Football" at JBS, we should tell the folks that the game of football is worth of amount they're gonna fork out.

Take example a movie.

What makes some of us watch the movie? Because it's the latest blockbuster with star-studded cast. Other than that, it's probably the review and the symposium that lured the audience to the cinemas.

While we may not have those mega stars paraded on our neighbourhood turfs, but what we can offer is the action-packed, high drama and unpredictable outcome football matches can offer.

This is why the crucial task here is to convince the folks, that watching football at stadiums near your home can be a cheaper alternative as compared to going to cinemas.

It come at a time where fans in European football leagues finding more and more costly to go to games, thus that "sense of alienating" is a pretty common sight in Europe, which is why I felt we should NOT make any adjustment to the current admission charges - PLAYING GOOD, ATTRACTIVE FOOTBALL TO BRING THE FANS (BACK) TO THE GROUNDS!!

Unless, you are one of those who can't understand the whole idea of 22 men chasing around leather spherical object on a patch of grass.

Last but not least though, is that the league is going miss two of its crowd-pullers: Home United's Indra Sahdan Daud and former Tampines Rovers striker Noh Alam Shah.

For dinstinctive reasons, Indra is heading to the States for a try-out with Real Salt Lake of the MLS (see the picture snapped from "Berita Harian", below)

While, for "Ah Long" (pictured below, with the blogger) is still appealing for the one-year ban on him to be lifted.

What a stark contrast of fate of these two of the best strikers we have in the recent years, Sight..

Let's the season begins...

2008 S.League Fanfare

The fanfare is a yearly ritual (except for last year) to draw the awareness of the fans that the season is coming.

Not going to repeat howI felt as i already mentioned TWO years ago (Click on the link to see what I wrote two years ago.)

Everything looks fine except those eardrum shattering music and crying from the "Muttons" of 987FM...

While waiting for the main match (the Charity Shield) between SAFFC and Home United, the fans at the ground saw themselves being entertained by those usual singing performance.

The curtain-raiser - Singapore Celebrity vs Korean "Celebrity", which the Koreans thrashed the local 3-0...

The Korean fans (of Super Reds) in jovial mood as they hoped their team will not repeat the lousy showing again... Good Luck!!

The Young Lions' booth at the fanfare...

The Warriors booth... always noisy and colorful..

Balestier and Geylang's booth side-by-side

YAaaawwwwwnnn......at JBS

What would I be doing at JBS (having waited for nearly 2 hrs for this err.. pedatangs encounter between Albirex Niigata and Dalian Shide) now when Chingay is ongoing??

The match wasn't really that great...

Was this the outcome of such a you-know-what-I-mean outing?

Certainly hope this cameraman has done his job to point out some short-comings of the match.

As for me while trying to endure myself to this game, which eventually saw me blog this entry (thanks Gary, for taking this shot...hehehe)

"蠢" (admended)

不是跟你说了吗?
Told you so, didn't I?

都叫你别干"那回事"了
Told you don't get involved with "that thing"

现在好啦!"一失足千古恨"
There you have it! "One wrong move and regret forever"

一个字形容你 - "蠢"
Only ONE word to describe you - BODOH! (stupid)

Some of you are puzzled who is the bespectacled guy talking over the phone?

His name is Zhao Zhipeng (赵志鹏), one of the Liaoning's seven being charged for "that thing".

As he's getting married soon, which was why He was the first to plead guilty to admit to have been involved in "that thing".

There you have a it - going to get married soon and caught with your pockets stuffed with ill-gotten cash.... so calling him "BODOH", sounded harsh??

Ok lah, "Hamtam" and see how lah..

One visitor made the abovementioned comment

So, for the benefit for all, I decided to draw out the whole process of it...

Hmm... perhaps should I ??

Ok lah, "Hamtam" and see how lah..

"Alrite, we will run your letter, thanks"

A "run-through" and see how it is...

"http://www.uploading.com/files/S39KR206/mysay-my-version.pdf.html" - Raw unedited version of my

"http://www.uploading.com/files/A3RIFHZJ/my13-018-0-myp.pdf.html" -"mypaper" version (after editing)

So based on the TWO versions, able to tell if "mypaper" had done a good job in interpret my views or not??

Wow that's expensive

P.S: Which is why I learnt to appreciate the good thing about blogging, as it's a useful tool to interact with your guests. Below is one such example.

Got a feedback from a visitor from Germany (see the cut-out graphic below).

This gentleman (or Lady) must have read my earlier entry "Looking for that year-end gift..." and answered my plead by directed me to a link mentioned in his/her reply (Thank you, "tj").

And much to my surprise, I was lead to the page as illustrated below!!

Wow!! a collection of the national team jerseys since the "Tiger" days to the current "Nike" Lionhead T-shirt!! (the one I been hunting high and low for it)



But based on the current exchange rate (is SG$53.989033) plus the necessary miscellanous charges, I 'm not sure if it's worth the hassle??

As based on the past experience like the one I had, when I first bought THE FINAL SHOWDOWN T-shirt (pictured above), I paid $30 odd for it, only to see the price being slashed significantly when SPORTSLINK had the NIKE warehouse sale on 1st Jan!!

Dashed off to Bishan just now...

Got a SMS from a friend just now, close to 4pm

FRIEND- "HappyNewYear, PoHui? Watching @Bishan later?"

ME- "There's a game? At 5pm.. Vs who? "

F- "Looks like Albirex, nt checked mail.."

M- "I be expecting a fren.. But will try to catch if I can make it.. Kick-off 5pm?" (as it's still festive mood with visiting taking places all over)

F- "Yeah, would do"

M- "Not likely to join as my fren is still ard.. Any update ?" (as my friend was still at my place when I texted my source at Bishan in middle of the game)

F- "3-0 to Home, Albirex gone "

M- "Plan aborted.. I comin.. Is the game play over 2 halves of 45mins or 3 periods of 30mins?" (Decided to catch a bit what had to offer since the Home United's national players were back )

F- "45mins" (At least, not as weird as last time I saw HU played against Super Reds)

M- "ok, roger and out... "

I guess another reason why the friendly matches were staged at 5pm instead of following the 7.45pm is probably because the renting club would not want to incur any extra electricity bills for switching on the floodlights? (Alrite Paul, as mentioned I had put down here :P)

Ok ok.. just joking.. think on the positive side, having 5pm matches is not a bad idea (in fact in the old Premier League days, some matches were played in the afternoon!), after all, it does allows fans and working media more flexibility though HEAT is one detering factor.

(Many thanks to Mr Ong JY for the tip-off of this friendly and Mr Paul Green for the concept of conceiving of this entry..)

真“笃x”...(it means "Pissed off", sorry for my language)

P.S: The long festive season gave me a rare opportunity to do some visual adjustments to this blog, as such you might have noticed some changes in the font "face" and colours , and some "out-of-the-box" postings like this.

I was on my way to a house visit near the site of my old secondary school, Pei Dao Secondary School (now shifted to Punggol and renamed as Punggol Secondary School but still retained its Chinese name “培道中学”).

Been told by my buddy about the astro-turf pitch inside the First Toa Payoh Secondary School's premises (the current occupier of the site that used to be Pei Dao's, having shifted from Toa Payoh Lorong One), I can't help but feel a bit “笃x” (DL in Hokkien, need not for me to elaborate)... after I saw the splendid turf.

I recalled the days in my secondary school that it's seems as if football was an "outlawed" sport with all efforts being given to volleyball (can't be help when the six-a-side net and ball game was the pride of the school), while there's hardly any spaces for us to have a kick-about.

We might had it on either of the two basketball courts within the school building but not without making the school 笃x” us :P

Therefore, the kickabout would be after the lessons, behind the open field of the school building (now converted as a car park).

There been thoughts and talks about forming a football team in the school during my days but to no avail and still stayed that way till I left and the school being relocated.

So can you imaging how I felt when I saw the pitch?

Invasion is coming!!!

I'm not a xenophobic (if not, I would have be the flag bearer of asking the "strictly-local-born" policy in the national team.) but the latest gimmick by the folks in London is way TOO MUCH!!

At least, should we say their conscience are CLEARER now as they finally realized after so many years of "holiday" football in this part of the world, the aristocrats really realized they need to be a bit more serious this time round.

But "Anglophiles", you would just have to "wait long long" as we will not have the mean to stage any of the matches unless the new Sports Hub is ready by 2010...

While at the meantime, I shake my head and declared, "FOOTBALL HAD LOST ITS GRASSROOTS LINK - FINALLY!!"