I would love to know what you all felt as fans when we lost that match 5-1 to Indonesia.

Were you hopeful or felt hopeless?

As a coach, I was obviously down, devastated but it was never in me as the coach to lose hope in my team. To be fair I could not because of that night that moment that was no reason for me to have felt that way, even after losing 5-1. I have been working with these boys when most of them were 15, 16 and 17, I knew that they had it in them something special to step up to the test we had from the 5-1 rout we got. Speaking to Tan that night we went through the match and we concluded that as a team we did not play badly it was individual mistakes and we got hammered 5 to 1.

We still had two more matches as part of the group stage, I had to hold strong and show the boys a positive front so that they will be strong to step into our next game against Thailand in the tourney. I had to do what was necessary for terms of our psychology to rally the boys up for our next match against Thailand. Which I felt were the best team in the tourney and the tougher team amongst the others we had to face in the group. I will need to say thank you to the boys for fuelling hopefulness!! Because on the flip side the boys gave me the strength to believe that they could do it and that we are going to get up from the results of the first match. I made some changes in the line-up and that is where the choice of the blue jersey being our lucky colour throughout the tourney, maybe that will be another opportunity to explain that side story. God Bless we know how this story turnout in the end but the focus of my write up today is on how we might have lost hope in our first step into the tourney but never ever lost hope throughout your journey.

This story to me, showed me what a group of Malaysians could do as a team to achieve a common goal and to push ourselves to wake up from being beaten down to pushing ourselves all the way to create history.

Football to me at the national level on a philosophical note showed me in many instances throughout my career what we Malaysians can do if we believe each other, work together as a team and be hopeful to achieve our greatest possibility. The boys, my coaching team, and I carry the essence of every Malaysian in us when we represent Malaysia at any stage. We all certainly can continue pushing our boundaries as Malaysians in every area of our lives and also as a nation.

In these tough times facing a pandemic I really hope our nation gathers the strength of our team (our people) to work together to emerge victorious against the current pressing situation. Take good care everyone. Stay Safe Stay home Stay hopeful like we did that night at Gelora Bung Karno.