BoLASEPaKO.COM - A Blog on Singapore Football

Am I glad the season is over! It must be one of the most dreadful seasons since my involvement when I breathed a sigh of relief after Albirex Niigata (Singapore) was finally awarded the trophy  that accoladed them as the inaugural champions of the revamped professional league aka Great Eastern-Hyundai Singapore Premier League (SGPL), despite the confirmation months earlier after their draw against Balestier Khalsa at Toa Payoh to close the 2018 season. Albirex Niigata (Singapore) established a dynasty in local football In an attempt to distance itself from the S.League which was associated with much of the flaws of the old regime, the Football Association of Singapore (FAS) announced the rebranding of the Republic's only professional sporting league as SGPL in a glittering setting at the Singapore Sports Hub (SSH) amid much skepticism from the ground . SUPERFICIAL CHANGES? Perhaps the only difference between the SGPL and the S.League is the change in the name and the...

Playing on an artificial surface  ... provides for more optimal deployment of resources” and “also frees up the other stadiums to be adapted for greater community use These words replied by the stadium landlord Sport Singapore (except for Our Tampines Hub which is owned by People’s Association) to the queries from The Straits Times, as quoted in an article by The Monitor , on the day the news broke out should be enough to explain the reasons behind the ground sharing decision which caused a ruckus in the scene of late. NOT SORRY AT ALL ... The fact is when those "evacuated" clubs, while at their allocated grounds, aren't doing enough to pack the stands at their home games (let's face it), there is no case for them to argue when the authority wants their stadiums to be more prioritised for community use. After all, the idea of ground sharing is not new when it was already mooted years ago  before the materialising of it next season. However, the issue we s...

71st SCC Rugby 7s @ Padang - 031118 A ball boy tossing the ball before the start of a game The SCC 7s is affectionally dubbed as the ‘Friendly Sevens’ and over the decades, legends like the late Jonah Lomu, New Zealand Rugby World Cup Sevens winning captain Eric Rush, All Blacks’ Hall of Famer Tana Umaga and South Africa’s former World Player of the Year Cecil Afrika graced the Padang on their ascendency to rugby stardom. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES 71st SCC Rugby 7s @ Padang - 041118 "There is a card for you" The SCC 7s is affectionally dubbed as the ‘Friendly Sevens’ and over the decades, legends like the late Jonah Lomu, New Zealand Rugby World Cup Sevens winning captain Eric Rush, All Blacks’ Hall of Famer Tana Umaga and South Africa’s former World Player of the Year Cecil Afrika graced the Padang on their ascendency to rugby stardom. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES AFF Suzuki Cup - Singapore 6-1...

The cover of the book  In short, to summarize my thoughts after reading this book is - thou shall not treat a football club neither as a toy nor as a money spinner. FAILURE TO ACKNOWLEDGE Citing two similar cases which were studied by author Bob Holmes - Nottingham Forest and Blackburn Rovers, it is not difficult to tell how foreign owners of these two clubs made a grave mistake for not to appreciate both are not merely football clubs but being a significant heritage and indispensable part of the community fabric of the vicinity where they are based. When both Al-Hasawis and Venkys paraded themselves to supporters of Forest and Rovers respectively after they bought the clubs, many promises were made to lift their teams out of the doldrums with some seems way beyond their means to deliver those dreams like the audacious bid to land Brazilian superstar Ronaldinho to Ewood Park in 2010. One of Mrs Desai's famous quotes after took over Blackburn Rovers  A few pages...

Singapore Cup - Balestier Khalsa 2-2 DPMM 031018 Most of the shots like this was snapped where the lights were the brightest  Although Balestier Khalsa Football Club drew 2-2 with DPMM FC, the Tigers were knocked out of the RHB Singapore Cup after losing 4-2 on aggregate to the Bruneians. Poor lightnings at the stadium made the shooting experience an arduous task. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES #ThankYouFara - 071018 Fahrudin Mustafic marked the end of his glittering career at OTH Our Tampines Hub witnessed the end of a great footballing career as Tampines Rovers Football Club skipper Fahrudin Mustafic retires from professional football with a testimonial match featuring some of the luminaries in local football in his honour. Thank you very much, Fara. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES Friendly - S'pore Selection 0-1 Australia U19 151018 The Young Socceroos played their last warm-up at Bishan before leavi...

In the very beginning, Mr Gaw Khek Khiam 's idea was to initiate a tournament similar to that of the Malaya Cup (now Malaysia Cup) but to be contested by Chinese footballers representing the various Malay States and Singapore in 1925. BLOATED ATTEMPT TO REPLICATE MALAYA CUP Unfortunately, the response to the concept of Semarang-born, Raffles Institution graduated Gaw was lukewarm from those Chinese football teams across the Straits of Johor when Singapore's footballing prowess was way ahead of them in that era. Chee Lim with Ho Ho Cup (Malayan Saturday Post, 25 May 1929 (NLB NewspaperSG online archive ) Not to be deterred by the lack of enthusiasm from the rest of the Malayan sides and had already spent a princely sum of £200 on a trophy made in England, the proprietor of the Ho Ho Biscuit Factory approached local renowned footballer Yee Cheok Wah and travelled together to Hong Kong where they proposed to organise a match between Chinese footballers represen...

Michel Sablon will leave FAS on 31st December 2018 Honestly, whether Michel Sablon's blueprint devised for the local football will work? Only time will tell and it is too quick to pass any judgment when the seeds were just sown after the land had just cleared for recultivation. While many fans seems to judge the Belgian's performance based on the less glamorous results achieved by various national teams in recent years, let us not forget the job scope of that of the technical director and the coach are two entirely different scopes. One is to formulate and layout the technical aspects of the game development, the other is to coach and achieve results on the field. Sablon gave a presentation on his blueprint Said local football observer Gary Koh: "We can only see in a few years whether Michel Sablon is a slight improvement (as compared to his predecessor Slobodan Pavkovic ) or otherwise. "But definitely never at the level of what he was p...

It would be kind of funny to read an article in the papers these days that lauded the achievements of local football, given the present state of the game in this country. Nevertheless, one such article did herald the achievements of the local game way back in 1950 when " Nanyang Siang Pau " (南洋商報), one of the main Chinese newspapers in those colonial days, declared "1950 is the Year of Singapore Football" on one of their back pages of their 12th of November edition. "1950 is the Year of Singapore Football" said Nanyang Siang Pau ( NLB archives ) Written by someone under the pseudonym of "流星" or "Meteoroid" in English, the opening statement attributed the significance of that year after teams represented Singapore did well in those tournaments they participated like the Singapore Malays won the Sultan Gold Cup, the Indians players took the Bardhan Cup and also the biggest prize of all - the Malaya Cup by the formidabl...

Lions Training Session 040918 Khairul Amri putting in the pace The Singapore National Team get together at Geylang Field to gear themselves for the upcoming friendly games against Mauritius and Fiji on 7th and 11th September respectively. PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR REST OF THE PICTURES Friendly: Singapore 2-0 Fiji 110918 Shahril Ishak (17) met with some Fijian resistance Singapore National Team won their first match under national interim coach Fandi Ahmad with a 2-0 win over Fiji at the Bishan Stadium. Prior to this match, the Lions drew one-all with Mauritius on the same ground. PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES

Nowadays, there is nothing wrong when we think of any player who doesn't perform in the modern game by labelled him being “unprofessional”. However, it was a different thing back in the old days, when the word "professional" was TABOO. Simply because players in those days were strictly amateur (as featured in the movie " Kallang Roar ") and any form of engagement with monetary reward was strictly prohibited. I was told by a former national player from that era how he was implicated when a boot manufacturer used his name without his knowledge in an advertisement that almost jeopardized his place in the national team. AFC's Teoh claimed Quah Kim Song "is a professional" in 1977 (NLB archives) Another player from that era almost saw his place in the national team gone when he was alleged to break the code of conduct as an amateur by an official of the game's continental governing body months before the South East Asia (SEA) Games. ...

I am wondering if was it because we played both Mauritius (FIFA ranked 155th) and Fiji (165th) in our recent friendlies that the ridiculing of our football continues by some skeptics? DIFFERENT EXPOSURE Granted the fact that both the aforementioned countries are not known for their football powress with someone even thought it was a rugby match when we took on the Fijians last evening , the two virtually unknown sides did, however, give Singapore national team some much-needed workouts in preparing for the upcoming AFF Suzuki Cup. Baihakki Khaizan (5) restraining Fijian captain Roy Krishna Instead of the "usual who" kind of opponents, I thought it was a refreshing change to see games against teams which allowed the Lions to expose to some robust kind of football aided by the opponents' much superior physical frames. It was probably this kind of exposure that made a good introduction to a different level of football between the domestic and internati...

AFC Cup - Home United 2-0 Ceres–Negros FC 080818 Shahrin Saberin (18) skipped across a Ceres player in this move Home United Football Club beat Ceres-Negros FC 2-0 in the second-leg of the AFC Cup Asean Zonal Final and qualified for the next stage of the tournament on a 3-1 aggregate. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES AFC Cup - Home United 0-2 "4.25" SC 210818 HUFC's Song Ui-young (8) tussling with Pak Jin-myong of 4.25 It was a different ball game when Home United Football Club progressed to the inter-zonal stages of the AFC Cup tournament. The Protectors lost 2-0 in the first-leg of the series against 4.25 SC from DPRK. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF THE MATCH PICTURES

"The Kung Sheung Daily News" report on the Singaporeans' debut for Kitchee in November 1950 This is a follow-up entry on the post regarding the  seven Singaporean players who played for Kitchee SC in Hong Kong First Division back in the 1950s . "Hong Kong Football History Society" , the Facebook Page that contributed the old newspaper clippings to the said entry back last month, posted a summary of the Singaporeans' debut in Kowloon on 12th November 1950. The summary was based on the match report filed by "The Kung Sheung Daily News" (工商日報) dated 13th November 1950. THE "TIGER BALM" CONNECTION  At the beginning of the summary, it was revealed that the recruitment of the Singaporeans was the brainchild of the late Aw Hoe (胡好) of the famed "Tiger Balm" Aw family despite at that point of time he had already exited from Hong Kong football scene and returned to Singapore in July 1950. "Not willing to see the...