There hasn’t been that much to smile about for Malaysian football fans in recent years, so there was real jubilation among the 60,000 home spectators upon the final whistle in Kuala Lumpur on on 10 June. A 4-0 win over regional rivals Vietnam not just kept the Harimau Malaya (Malayan Tigers) on course for the 2027 Asian Cup but well and truly confirmed they were dining back at the top table in southeast Asia. Four months later, they are still the talk of the region of 650 million people, but not in a good way.
The story starts, as it does increasingly in Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) football these days, with naturalisation. In January, the crown prince of Johor, Tunku Ismail Sultan Ibrahim, the owner of Johor Darul Ta’zim football club, and former president of the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM), wrote on social media: “We have identified 6-7 heritage players … and hope the Malaysian government could assist in the process of obtaining Malaysian passports in order for them to play in the Asian Cup 2027 qualifiers.”
