As you may have already heard or read, Johor Darul Ta’zim FC (JDT) has been described as a “shrine”.
And all week, we have been told that the southern club and its stakeholders are a harmful influence, and a disruptive force in an already troubled Malaysian league.
The club may be accused of practising strategies that cause misery to the national team and the domestic league, but the club was never in the business of making the Harimau Malaya more resolute, or the league more competitive.
The management’s entire focus is on the club and its stakeholders. And this is probably where the distinction stems.
Malaysian football supporters are die-hard conservatives who are mostly collectivistic in culture. Their motivation prioritises solidarity over individual goals.
Political narratives that play along those values tickle their earlobes and send shivers of approval down their front.
“You can’t say that,” shrieked a young woman from the audience during a recent forum after she heard me say that JDT was right to predominantly think of the club and had no prerogative towards Harimau Malaya or the league.
The statement was an adrenaline shot to many of the people who attended the forum titled, ‘The Challenges a Professional Football Club Faces When Embedding Business Components’, organised by Universiti Malaya.
Trust me, it quickly felt like I was drowning in a puddle of spit.
It’s the same story with salaries. No one is allowed to pay their footballers double, or triple the average amount, even when they can clearly afford it.
Someone decided that this is so, and somehow it has now become the unwritten law. Any club that dares to flout that law will find itself sentenced to spend the rest of its life as a quivering ‘hermit’ – positioned at the very top of the league, playing in the Asian Champions League with other ‘hermits’ around
in the region.
The fact is though, no one placed a knife on anyone’s throat and forced other clubs to pay their football players similarly to JDT.
A deliberate decision was made. When the decision was not well-calculated and the clubs seem to be in a bit of a pickle, they tend to lose their heads, wandering about in public, shedding tears, and conveniently placing the blame on JDT, masking their poor financial planning practices and incompetence.
JDT is rich. These days, being rich is evil. Being poor is noble.
Being rich and giving your money away to other needy clubs makes you a “shrine”, and therefore, to be sneered at. This is presumably why some other club owners are angry most of the time.
But having sudden episodes of impulsive, aggressive, or mindless verbal outbursts is just plain silly, more so when one is a politician.
This is because he or she may end up losing in the upcoming general election – which would be hilarious.
This is the personal opinion of the writer and does not necessarily represent the views of Twentytwo13.
