The Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) announced the suspension of its secretary general on Friday pending an investigation after FIFA said the country had cheated by fielding ineligible players.
Last month, FIFA suspended seven overseas-born players who all featured for Malaysia in a 2027 Asian Cup qualifier and fined FAM US$438,000, citing falsified or doctored documentation involving the players’ grandparents.
Malaysia beat Vietnam 4-0 in the June game.
Photo: AP
FAM vice president Sivasundaram Sithamparam Pillai said that the FAM has formed a committee to investigate the case.
He said that FAM secretary-general Noor Azman Rahman has been suspended so that the committee can carry out its probe independently. No FAM members would be on the committee, he said, but gave no further details.
“FAM maintains that these players were lawfully naturalized in accordance with Malaysian law,” he said. “FAM remains steadfast in our mission to uphold transparency, to protect Malaysian football’s reputation.”
The case has been a setback for Malaysian soccer at a time when former FAM president Hamidin bin Haji Mohd Amin sits on the 37-member FIFA Council.
Former Malaysian king Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah was also a member of FIFA’s ruling committee from 2015 to 2019.
Serge Vittoz, an international sports lawyer representing FAM, said FIFA is set to make its decision on Malaysia’s appeal against the sanctions on Oct. 30.
He said the main contention of the appeal was that FAM and the seven players were not responsible for any forgery.
“There was no forgery on the side of the players. There was no forgery on the side of the FAM as an institution, and if any wrongdoing was done, it should be targeted to the person in question,” he said at a FAM news conference, without elaborating on who should be held responsible.
If unsuccessful, he said FAM would seek a reduction in its liability and might take the case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
In its report last month, FIFA said FAM had submitted forged documents saying the grandparents of the seven players were born in Malaysia — making them eligible to represent the country under FIFA’s nationality rules.
The committee said original certificates showed the said family members had been born in the same countries as the players: Argentina, Brazil, the Netherlands and Spain.
The FIFA report said that FAM admitted it “was contacted by external agencies regarding the players’ heritage and yet failed to independently verify the authenticity of the documentation.”
TITLE CAMPAIGN: The victory sent the Monkeys to the Taiwan Series for the third time in the past four seasons as they seek their first championship since 2019 The stage is set for the Taiwan Series after the Rakuten Monkeys on Monday beat the Uni-President Lions 4-3 in Game 5 of the CPBL Challenger Series in Kaohsiung. The Monkeys, who entered the top of the ninth scoreless, tied the game with a three-run blast by Lin Chih-ping and scored the winning run in the 10th on an RBI single by Lin Li, a three-time batting champion in the CPBL. Both players entered the game as pinch hitters. “The coach told me to stay prepared as a pinch hitter in the later part of the game. My teammates had
Taiwanese badminton ace Chou Tien-chen was crowned the men’s singles champion at the Arctic Open on Sunday, after defeating Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand 21-11, 13-21, 21-19. The 35-year-old Chou, who is ranked world No. 5, and the 24-year-old Vitidsarn, ranked world No. 3, battled it out for one hour and 17 minutes in a grueling three-game match at Energia Areena in Vantaa, Finland. In the first game, Chou took an early 9-7 lead and maintained his momentum, widening the gap, before defeating Vitidsarn 21-11. At the start of the second game, the two players were neck-and-neck. When Vitidsarn pulled ahead
The Ministry of Sports on Wednesday night called for the Chinese Taipei Football Association (CTFA) to address issues in Taiwanese soccer after national manager Huang Che-ming on Tuesday resigned following Taiwan’s elimination in AFC Asian Cup qualifiers. Taiwan on Tuesday were thrashed 6-1 by Thailand in their Group D tie at Taipei Municipal Stadium. Taiwan finished with no points, after losing all four of their matches, eliminating them from qualifying for the 2027 AFC Asian Cup. Huang made his surprise resignation at a post-match news conference, following three losses since he took over the team from English coach Gary White in August. Huang
HIT AND RUN: Toronto manager John Schneider got his wish that his team ‘find some slug in the air out here,’ as the Blue Jays combined to total 611m of homers Tired in Toronto, the Blue Jays slugged in Seattle. Vladimir Guerrero Jr and George Springer on Wednesday woke up the Jays, as Toronto hit five home runs to rebound from an early deficit, routing the Mariners 13-4 and closing to 2-1 in the American League Championship Series (ALCS). Toronto had 18 hits — all within the first three pitches of each at-bat. “If they give us a first pitch, the pitch that we’re looking for, we’re going to attack and we’re going to be aggressive,” Guerrero said. Seattle starter George Kirby gave up eight of the hits. “I wasn’t really executing when they got
RSS