Malaysia v Arsenal: match preview and Tan Sri Datuk Seri Setia Raja Hamzah Haji Abu Sama « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade

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If you think you know your Arsenal, it is time to think again. Woolwich Arsenal, the club that changed football.

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By Billy the Dog McGraw

Having left Sir Toby Belch in control of the homespun fixtures, and hearing that he is still stranded on the M25 Olympic Canal Lane, I have followed the beloved team of The Arsenal to Malaysia, a small island off the coast of Peru.

I have to say that the game has attracted little local interest and there are fears as to the number of people who will be present, but that won’t stop me from filing full details and a report or two.  Once I can find the ground that is.  Peru’s a big place you know, and you can’t expect local people to know where Kuala Lumpur is, or Putrajaya, just because you ask them.  I mean it is like asking a man in Basingstoke where Dorset is!  Duh!

Meanwhile the team

Szczesny

Jenkinson    Vermaelen  (capt)   Miquel   Gibbs

Song

Diaby   Arteta

Gervinho    Afobe  Oxlade-Chamberlain

OK so I have left out Theo, and stuck Benik Afobe in the middle.  What are the alternatives to that forward line?  There’s Ryo, Theo and Chamakh.  (Incidentally there’s no Park on the tour – has he been frozen out or is he still recovering from internationals or has he been hijacked and forced to play in the Olympics which I am told are taking place in Paris next week.?)

Here is the alternative

Walcott  Gervinho  Oxlade-Chamberlain

Gervinho has to show that he has finally got over the Africa Cup of Nations, and there is the idea he could actually play in the middle.  But Oxlade Chamberlain has to be there because “Oxlade-Chamberlain” is unpronounceable in Malaysian.  Mind you so is “Szczesny”.  But then “Szczesny” in unpronounceable in any language.

Anyway, Malaysia, and its football.  Just to give you a flavour of what’s what, here is an extract from a press release on the Malaysian FA site

Adalah dimaklumkan bahawa Persatuan ini melalui Jawatankuasa Tatatertib telah menyiasat kes wujudnya unsur-unsur Rasuah dan gejala Mengatur Perlawanan ke atas Pasukan Piala Presiden

So there.   There is supposedly an article on the hiring of foreign players, but the link took me to a very aggressive “Get Lost” page, so I quickly ran away.

Malaysia was part of the British Empire, its legal system is based on English “common law” and it is a parliamentary democracy which strikes me as a Good Thing.

Football arrived in Malaya with the British, which is perhaps why they like Arsenal since for many years Arsenal was the British, the British were Arsenal.  (If you want to know how this happened you need to read “Woolwich Arsenal, the club that changed football”.

In 1921, a national tournament featuring all the states that made up Malaya was started.  This was just after the battleship HMS Malaya visited the country. After engaging local opposition in football and rugby, the officers and men of HMS Malaya decided to commemorate the matches by presenting trophies for annual competitions in both rugby and football in Malaya.

They were thus quite clearly Jolly Good Chaps.

In 1933, the MFA was revived to form the Football Association of Malaya under the guiding hand of  Sir Beefstake McCaldecott- Shelley-Webster, of whom it has been said.  FAM became one of 14 founding members of the Asian Football Confederation in 1954, and joined the criminal gangs of money launderers, thieves and con-artists known as Federation of International Fraudsters Associated (Fifa)  in 1956.

At first it was the country’s Prime Ministers who ran the FAM but then along came Tan Sri Datuk Seri Setia Raja Hamzah Haji Abu Samah in 1976.

Now if you are of a British characteristic and you think that sometimes I have a little bit too much to drink and make things up, well let me tell you sunshine, if you come to Peru and say that I’ll show you what for.  This guy was Minister for Trade and Industry and he was or maybe is, real.  I think its a great name and I am changing my name to his by deed poll as soon as I find the airport.

In 2004 the country adopted a Super League of 14 clubs.  Get relegated and you drop down to the Premier League.  I support Terengganu FA simply because I like words with two g’s in the middle.

So there it is.  No sign of the Arsenal, nor any press pack.  I might as well be in the wrong country.

Oh bugger.

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