Singapore And Indonesia In Final Battle
15 Jan 2005
Singapore, 15 Jan 2005 The battle lines have been drawn. After 25
matches, 105 goals, 7 red and 80 yellow cards, it all boils down to
this one final match.
In one corner, home team Singapore, holding a precious 3-1
advantage from the first leg. Unheralded at the start of the
tournament, the Lions have grown in stature as the tournament
progressed and now stand on the verge of adding to their only piece
of silverware won during the 1998 Tiger Cup.
Standing in their way of glory is Indonesia, coached by the
tournaments most successful coach, Englishman Peter Withe.
Two-time winners in 2000 and 2002 with Thailand, he now faces
arguably his greatest challenge as a coach in this region.
The match has simply caught the imagination of the Singaporean
public, with all 55,000 tickets snapped up within two days of going
on sale.
Its been a long time since a football match involving the national
side has created such a buzz. Perhaps, only a tournament such as
the Tiger Cup, so close to the hearts of many in South-East Asia,
could revive the once-famed Kallang Roar.
People like to be associated with a winning team. Theres nothing
wrong with that, especially in success-starved Singapore (in
football terms at least). Their appearance in the final on Sunday
will actually be only Singapores second ever on home soil apart
from the 1983 SEA Games Football Final and only their fourth ever
in their long history.
Indonesia are in more familiar territory after finishing runners-up
in both 2000 and 2002, ironically to their current coachs former
team.
Desperate to make it third time lucky, they were heavily fancied
after storming through the group stage and blitzing past Malaysia
in Kuala Lumpur in the semi-finals.
Playing in front of 120,000 fanatical home fans in the first leg in
the Senayan Stadium in Jakarta, they were stunned by a spirited
Singapore display and were perhaps fortunate to keep the tie alive
with Mahyadi Panggabeans injury time deflected freekick.
The ever-positive Withe is adamant the tie is far from over and is
determined to silence the capacity home crowd on Sunday.
What happened in the first leg was in the past. We cant change
the past but we can change the future and we have to look towards
that.
Both teams have suspensions to contend with, although Indonesia has
greater selection worries with both first choice center-halves out
of the equation. They also face an anxious final 24 hours to see if
mercurial winger Boas Salossa recovers from his ankle injury
sustained in the first leg.
Singapore on the other hand will only be missing striker Noh Alam
Shah with previous first choice forward Indra Sahdan expected to
slot back in.
Lions coach Radojko Avramovic, with almost 15 years experience
coaching in Asia, knows that opportunities such as this does not
come too often in a football career, whether as a player or a
coach.
Drumming home this fact to his team, he said, We have a fantastic
opportunity to win something in front of our home fans. Playing in
the final of a major tournament at home with a two-goal advantage
is like a dream and we have to capitalise on it. It will be such a
waste if we blow this opportunity.
Both camps have had their say and now it boils down to the 90
minutes, 11 men against 11 men. At the end, only one will be
crowned champions of Asean.