My First Love

Who would win if the Chicago Bulls play against the Tamil Tigers? The game is going to be a blast. Sometimes people like to give fancy names to make things interesting. The Eagles are in Geylang while the Dolphins are in Sengkang. How many of you know that? Geylang is actually famous for Beef Hor Fun, Frog legs porridge and where you will find the world's oldest profession - the chick trade. 


Now that is crying fowl. As a young boy watching black and white TV, the most popular sport on TV back then was wrestling if it's considered one. That was the influence because all the fathers and uncles were watching it. Usually those who wore black or anything that look remotely black are the baddies. So as a young kid, when I got to watch the first soccer match on TV (we called it "football' back then), my first question was which team is the good one? 


Was the one in darker attire the bad ones? Many poorer families who do not own a television set at home have to go to a community centre to watch TV where you would find some 20 people or so sitting on benches watching either one of probably two channels. You do not find them switching channels or arguing and fighting over which to watch. In our modern homes today, it is common to find two or more TV sets hooked up to cable TV where you have countless channels to watch anything, anytime with the remote at your fingertip. 


Yet we find ourselves having less time which is ironic. Technology is wonderful as it now allows me to access the Football Channel on my Blackberry so that I could still get a glimpse if I were to be away but I would rather have pay per view than to be charged a lump sum for all 7-8 games playing live simultaneously. You would sit up watching the later games at or past midnight and then decide to get more comfortable only to find yourself slouching and falling asleep waking up up at 3am not remembering which teams were playing let alone what the score was. Gone were the days where one could stay up from 3-5am for the European matches or World Cup and then still go to work the next day.

Introduction and the Formative Years

When I first played soccer in primary school, I could not find joy in the game as at that time, most of us looked and felt under nourished and with a small and skinny frame, the ball looked big and felt heavy. It was from 1974 and the secondary school years that got me hooked on soccer. It was a soccer-crazy school where at the time the school was always in the finals of the C, B, and A boys tourney. Some matches were played at the school field and I would be there to watch them or when played during lesson time, nobody was paying attention with the classroom doors opened and everyone became dismal and sad when ordered to close the doors. 

During the finals held at the Jalan Besar Stadium, the school would close for half a day so that we could troop over to lend support with drums and all the chantings and singing turning it into a carnival. I could not understand why this same spirit seems to have stopped at school level and not transcended to club or national level. We have numerous players who played for Combined Schools and the national team. We would some times have the national team over to train at the school ground when the Jalan Besar Stadium was occupied. 

Before and after school and even during recess, you would find a jam-packed basketball court turned into a soccer battle ground with hordes of different group of students playing at the same time with a plastic ball bought from a mamak shop. This required animal and insect instincts needing more than telepathic understanding to find your team mates. I'm not a fool to think that we have continued playing under such trying conditions, Singapore could have been futsal world champions!

The World Cup and Colour TV

1974 was important because of the World Cup and the coverage gave me new angles and excitement. I was captivated when I saw "The World At Their Feet", a documentary of the 1970 World Cup. It coincided that I was able to watch it for the very first time in colour as colour TV was introduced. It was an outlet for relief as my favourite hero Bruce Lee has just died in 1973. I needed a reprieve. I saw the Flying Dutchmen took on the mighty Germans with players like Johann Cruyff, Johann Neeskens, Robbie Resenbrink, Franz Beckanbauer, Bertie Vogts, Paul Breitner, Wolfgang Overath, Gerd Muller, Sepp Maier, Jurgen Grabowski. we were also introduced to telematch hosted by Toby Charles and I swear I could speak German - Achtung! eins, zwei, drei, pee pee (sound from whistle) and then there was Football Made In Germany. Wunderbar! Steady poon pee pee.

Star Soccer

In the old days, you only get to watch the highlights of the previous week with 22 teams meaning 11 games squeezed into an one hour programme called Star Soccer. It was known as the First Division. The only team that has animal connotation was Wolves aka Wolverhampton Wanderers. We have the good ole teams like Leeds United, West Ham, Leceister, Carlisle, Coventry, West Bromwich Albion (WBA), QPR and Stoke City plying the trade. Coventry, Derby and Everton came to Kallang and I watched them for the first time. 

No other soccer league including those from Brazil, Germany, Spain or Italy even up to today could provide more thrills and spills. I would save up and lap up all the issues of "Shoot", "Match" and "World Soccer" magazines and pull up the centre spread as pin up to paste on my room walls. I kind of knew everything there is to know. A "live' match every once in awhile was such a big thing that everybody would stay up to watch frequently even applying a day off. 

I remembered Wolves has John Richards, Leeds was great under Don Revie who later became England manager and they have Billy Bremner, David Harvey, Gordon McQueen, Paul Madeley, Eddie Gray, Joe Jordan, Norman Hunter, the stylish Allan Clarke and many more. Leceister has Frank Worthington, Coventry - Tommy Hutchinson, WBA - Johnny Giles, Stoke has Gordon Banks and later Alan Hudson, while Trevor Francis played for Birmingham before joining Nottingham Forest to be the first million-pound player. 

QPR has Stan Bowles, Roy Wegerle and Gerry Francis. Derby County has Roy McFarland, Roger Davies, Francis Lee, Bruce Rioch, Colin Todd. Arsenal had Charlie George, Pat Jennings and later Tony Adams. I'm recalling all these without reference. Spurs has Ricardo Villa, Osvaldo Ardilles, Jurgen Klinsmann, Glen Hoddle, Chris Waddle and Paul Gascoigne. West Ham produced some of the best players even till today - Bobby Moore, Martin Peters, Geoff Hurst, Alan Devonshire, Trevor Brooking and today they gave Rio Ferdinand, Joe Cole, Frank Lampard and more. 

Then we have Liverpool who not only ruled England but also Europe. Ray Clemence, Phil Neal, Alan Kennedy, Jimmy Case, David Johnson, Craig Johnston, Phil Thomson, Tommy Smith, Alan Hansen, Graeme Souness, super-sub David FairClough, Kevin Keegan, John Toshack, Kenny Dalglish, John Barnes, Ian Rush, Sammy Lee, John Aldridge, Ronnie Whelan, Ray Kennedy, Bruce Grobelaar, Greame Souness, Ian Rush, Robbie Fowler, Ray Houghton, Stan Collymore, David James, Steve McManamam, Jamie Redknapp and many more. We would later have the Match of the Day F.A. Cup special matches. Clemence ruled the roost playing more like a sweeper than a goalie and was always first to the ball dealing with high crosses. 

Mighty mouse Kevin Keegan went on to help Liverpool win the European Cup and twice voted European Footballer of the Year. We sing to the Kops' tune of "We'll Never Walk Alone". The "This Is Anfield" sign at the tunnel was awesome as it reminds opposing teams of what is to happen to them. Keegan was never as gifted as Cruyff or George Best but he could do things that both could not through sheer grit. I remembered that goal when Trevor Brooking floated a cross and Keegan took a mighty leap to glance a looping header past Italy's Dino Zoff for England's 2-0 win in a WC qualifier.

EPL

I don't follow any particular team anymore after the famous Liverpool teams of Keegan/Toshack and Dalglish/Rush era disintegrated. I only followed those that play with gusto with flowing attacking soccer. West Ham and Tottenham Hostspurs are two of such teams. Manchester United qualifies too but I dislike them for their arrogance but their history is nothing short of awesome. Just think of the Busby Babes in particular Duncan Edwards, Bobby Charlton, Dennis Law and George Best. 

Bobby Charlton when interviewed recently still believe that Duncan Edwards would have been the best and most complete player the world ever produced even when he was just 21 or younger when he died in the Munich air crash. He should know, he has played with the best. Newcastle United and then Manchester City were my favourites later simply because they played breath-taking, cavalier attacking soccer and it was no coincidence that Kevin Keegan was their manager. Only Newcastle with their style of swash-buckling soccer could have beaten Manchester United 5-0. The team that has Philip Alberts, Robert Lee, Peter Beardsley, David Ginola, Les Ferdinand.

EPL (English Premier League) or BPL (Barclays Premier League) whichever you call it has has defied logic until lately. There seems to be no recession even as the world crumbled. Cristiano Ronaldo was sold for 80 million pounds! Manchester United has set the bench mark and Arsenal has pipped them on three occasions while Chelsea too has been a strong challenger in recent years. Frankly, Liverpool should have won the League title last year. Manchester United was good but wasn't awesome and Liverpool lost only 2 games all season but they drew too many - all 11 of them and they failed to conquer the weaker teams. In today's EPL, Arsenal plays the most scintillating soccer. Arsenal in full flow is a sight to behold. There is something about their movement that Arsene Wenger taught. If Barcelona is Budweiser, then Arsenal is Budweiser Light for there is no other team that plays better than Barcelona on planet earth. Poetry in motion.

Arsenal

I think this is going to be Arsenal's year. The 3 "Ars" are in line - "Ars"enal, "Ars"ene Wenger and "Ars"havin. Manchester United is still strong but a pale shadow of themselves. Giggs and Scholes are still good but getting on in age. Liverpool missed out the last time and are too dependent on Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard. Even a red beach ball was against them when Sunderland's Darren Bent's shot deflected against it into goal. Chelsea are difficult to play against but they are beatable these days. Tottenham are showing true promise under Harry Redknapp but their curse may continue. Martin O'Neill's Aston Villa are pushing the limit and Manchester City aka Abu Dhabi City are buying success but Wenger stayed the course with his young team. There is something special about the way they move. Something in the way she moves....as George Harrison sang. 

To me, Arsene Wenger is like no other. Since he left Nagoya Grampus 8 to join Arsenal he has made superstars out of ordinary looking players everytime and sell them just at the right time and he could gel a team playing his brand of soccer. Thierry Henry was an ordinary winger at Juventus when Wenger plucked him from obscurity and turned him into one of the world's best player at his peak. He has scored exhilarating goals with his deft dribbles and curling free kicks. Henry was the EPL's best player by a mile. Then there was Patrick Viera who has no peers at the heart of midfield. Do not forget about Robert Pires who was even named Enlgish Player of the Year with his wonderful runs and goals from the flanks. What about Dennis Bergkamp, the skilful and intelligent Dutchman? There was that wonderful season where the Gunners went on a rampaging unbeaten run of some 48 games.

Kolo Toure and Adebayor have gone on to Manchester City but the present side has gems in new signing Thomas Vermaelen who in his first season is playing like he has been there for ages even scoring quite a few goals and topping the scorers' chart as a defender. Captain Cesc Fabregas who has just become an adult not long ago is really going to be one of the finest midfielders in the world at the rate he is going. He is the kind of midfielder that England and Singapore lacks - play-making. Robbie van Persie is showing he is capable of taking charge of delivering the goals while speed demon Theo Walcott when fit at his tender teen age is uncatchable once he gets past defenders. There are others like Eboue, Gael Clichy, Diaby, Song, Almunia, Manone, Sagna, Gallas, Silvestre, Traore, Tomas Rosicky, Samir Nasri, Andrey Arshavin, Aaron Ramsey, new youngster Jack Wilshere, Denilson, Nicklas Bentner, Eduardo and Carlos Vela are all exciting. 

Wenger has a keen eye for talents. He took young talents and mould them instead of buying finished products and a the right time sell them for a tidy profit. People still question him on his methods but you can't teach old dogs new tricks. Young players are taught his way of playing soccer so that they could develop a similar vision, thinking, style and philosophy. I think Arsene Wenger should be given a lifetime achievement award for what he has brought to English soccer and what he had done for Arsenal. This is about giving opportunities to people and with guidance to excel. They will repay you. A few may be ungrateful but many will respond appropriately.

Arsene Wenger

I'm a big fan of Arsene Wenger. I'll give you a few selected quotes to let you see the measure of the man. He is not called "The Professor" for nothing.

"I believe the target of anything in life should be to do it so well that it becomes an art. When you read some books they are fantastic, the writer touches something in you that you know you would not have brought out of yourself. He makes you discover something interesting in your life. If you are living like an animal, what is the point of living? What makes daily life interesting is that we try to transform it to something that is close to art. And football is like that. When I watch Barcelona, it is art."

After the success of the Great Britain team at the Olympics: "I didn't know the English were good at swimming. I have been in this country for 12 years and I haven't seen a swimming pool."

On Jose Mourinho after the then Chelsea boss accused him of being a voyeur: "He's out of order, disconnected with reality and disrespectful. When you give success to stupid people, it makes them more stupid sometimes and not more intelligent."

In response to Sepp Blatter's accusation that big clubs were guilty of 'child slavery: "If you have a child who is a good musician, what is your first reaction? It is to put them into a good music school, not in an average one. So why should that not happen in football?"

"The biggest things in life have been achieved by people who, at the start, we would have judged crazy. And yet if they had not had these crazy ideas the world would have been more stupid."

"There is no better psychological education than growing up in a pub when you are five or six because you meet all different people and hear how cruel they can be. You hear the way they talk to each other like saying 'You're a liar.' And from an early age you get a practical psychological education into the minds of people."

"Gerard Houllier's thoughts on the matter [international football] echo mine. He thinks that what the national coaches are doing is like taking the car from his garage without even asking permission. They will then use the car for ten days and abandon it in a field without any petrol left in the tank. We then have to recover it, but it is broken down. Then a month later they will come to take your car again, and for good measure you're expected to be nice about it."

"Nobody has enough talent to live on talent alone. Even when you have talent, a life without work goes nowhere."

"The real revelation of a player's character is not in his social life but in how he plays. In my social life I can hide my real personality." (That's true of golf too?)

"I am in a job where you always look in front of you. Unfortunately, the older you get, the less distance there is in front of you." (Are you getting it?)

We try to go a different way that, for me, is respectable. Briefly, these are the basics. I thought: "We are building a stadium, so I will get young players in early so I do not find myself exposed on the transfer market without the money to compete with the others. I build a team, and we compensate by creating a style of play, by creating a culture at the club because the boy comes in at 16 or 17 and when they go out they have a supplement of soul, of love for the club, because they have been educated together. The people you meet at college from 16 to 20, often those are the relationships in life that keep going. That, I think, will give us strength that other clubs will not have."

"What motivates me is an ideal of thinking about how football should be. And to try to get near this way of playing. And to try to improve all aspects of my personality that can help me get near this ideal way of playing football." (That's what I'm tyring to do with golf - thinking how it should be played. Boring or attacking? How to get that "ideal" way of playing and turn it into an art).

OBG (Oldies But Goodies)

Meantime, despite condemnation from some quarters, David Beckham showed just what he could do when he was voted Man-of-the-Match when England won their last qualifier against Belarus. As I have said before, fear not the man who practises one thousand different kicks once but fear the man who practises one kick a thousand times. Old is and can still be gold. Why do a person who turns 60 or 62 need to have a pay cut in these days of anti-discrimination? Isn't that the same as bullying women, child or maid abuse, racial and gender discrimination? Obama won the Nobel peace prize even before he could achieve something. They say they gave it to him so that he is now obligated to fulfill it. Why do they take advantage of older folks who turned a certain age and why don't they give us some awards in advance too so that we could go on to fulfill them? That's how the world works that's why it keeps failing.