YOUTH

Youth leagues in Malaysia is being administered by FAM and its a very good way to find and give young players more playing time which is where we lack so much. Put NFDP aside as I feel its on the right track and soon we will have a good set of players coming from it. What about the others?
 Are we educating them well in the Piala Belia and Piala Presiden?
Been watching some games and sessions past few months and some are good and some are just a sorry state. Some teams are just participating just because they have too, some are just there cause of a job, some are lost and don't know what the h### is going on. Good ones are organizing and planning sessions towards the games, nourishing players with proper information and educating them well.
I have not been a head coach of a youth team and true some will think what do I know of the troubles face by them, I am only penning my thoughts and my evaluation. My experience is with the U19 and U23 in the National Team  for the past 3 years are my point of reference. I have been with the senior team in league and National team for a total of 11 years and I always thought why do young players come to the senior team lost and not knowing what to do in game situations and how to take care of themselves.
This I believe goes down to education at the youth level and what ethics we surround our youth players. When we first took the U19 National team, Coach Boyan commented on the lack of tactical knowledge of this youth players and there was a massive negative comment on it. I do agree that at the beginning 80% of players did not understand their roles in certain positions and knowing tactical game plans. But they wanted to learn and was open to it but it was not easy but it worked. We managed to do fairly well in the AFF U19 (2017) in Myanmar and went up to the final to crash out to Thailand, and also push our way thru to the upcoming  AFC U19 final round in October 2018. We had few players in the U23 squad towards the AFC U23 and three players made it to the final squad to China. The U23 squad worked hard and manage to break barriers and reach the quarter finals, where we lost 2-1 to South Korea.
Yes this are all the best players from each state and thanks to them, but in International games, without tactical knowledge and discipline in the game, we are bound to be punish and crushed.
This is where I firmly believe if we are committed and educate ourselves well, than we can help and nourish this young players to be better players on and off the pitch.
Coming back to the league, when a coach shouts at a player during a game situations such as defending a corner kick, why no one covering the back, why no one marking, and etc, my question is Did you teach the players what to do during the corner kick, how you plan to defend as in block or man to man. Body position, how to clear the ball and also where he should clear the ball, where does our keeper position himself and how the defenders must protect the keeper if he comes out to save or punch the ball out. Are they aware of the opponents set pieces, and player movement of the opponents. Where should our top player position himself to receive the ball when the clearance has been done, which players should run up to support the top player when he has possession of the ball to initiate a counter on the opponent. These are few of what I can think at the moment, Are we educating our players or not? We can't use the excuse ; They should know! No they don't know and its our duty to educate and help them understand the basics in the youth level so its easy when they play in the senior level or abroad.
I have seen NFDP playing in Piala Belia and its clear that the players are well educated on their positions and responsibilities. Some will say cause they have money and expose to many international games but I also have some teams in Belia who has been coach well by the respective coaches and players are progressing well so I don't believe in this excuse.
I believe if we engage good coaches and COMMITTED coaches in the Piala Belia and Piala President we will see the senior teams using these players in their first teams as you can see in the league now. There are so many young players below age 23 breaking and cementing their spot in the first team.
We can create a new set of players to improve our current state of Malaysian football if we all play our part and educate ourselves.

Just my own thoughts and lets discuss to make a better Malaysia football team.

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