While most eyes will be firmly fixed on the titanic clash between Johor DT and Pahang, there’s another particular clash with the exact amount of zest and excitement about it. Felda United will be hosting Selangor in what could potentially be an explosive affair, due to several incidents that took place last year.
When Mehmet Durakovic arrived at the Shah Alam Stadium last year, fans were dreaming of a revival in fortunes. In fact, they sort of got that in the Super League, where Johor DT narrowly pipped them to league title. So when the Malaysia Cup got underway, Selangor fanatics naturally had plenty of high hopes for them, which all came crumbling down on one fine evening.
Having finished second in Group D of the competition, they booked their spot in the quarter finals of the competition, where Felda United were waiting them; with plenty to showcase and nothing to lose. After all, they were a Premier League side and they already secured promotion to the Super League at that point; which was the ultimate motive of their season.
But the first leg of their tie against Selangor was out of this world. They royally whooped the Red Giants on their own turf in Shah Alam, netting four goals past Durakovic’s men to secure a massive 4-0 advantage heading into the second leg. But the match was rather iconic for Selangor, as it instigated a turning point and things started to get sour for them afterwards.
A group of Selangor fans gathered at the SUK training pitch in Shah Alam and confronted the Selangor players, demanding for an explanation on what transpired in the first leg of that clash. And you wouldn’t entirely call them unreasonable either, because Selangor did look out of sorts in that match. There was no desire, there was barely any motivation on the pitch. And what frustrated fans the most was the fact that none of players showcased any willingness to produce a response on the pitch, every time Felda netted a goal. It was one-way traffic, to be honest.
They got accused of pandering to match-fixers and players became disillusioned. Soon enough, an internal crisis started brewing within the Selangor FA and their prized asset in the form of Paulo Rangel took on to social media to slam the management over wage payment issues, which eventually led to his departure later on. It’s safe to say that things got pretty haywire with them, and fans were getting equally restless on the touchlines.
Since then, several big players left the team, and new names were signed up to form the 2015 squad. Mehmet Durakovic was retained as the head coach, while Shahrom Kalam was appointed as the new skipper. But their start to the 2015 Malaysia Super League season has reflected anything but cohesion and sheer ability. Selangor are winless in three games and they’ve only found the back of the net twice, with both goals coming from Andik Vermansyah; a clear sign of over-dependence. Guilherme, Hazwan Bakri, Hadi Yahya, Thamil Arasu and Afiq Azmi have all fired blanks so far, despite being rated as some of the most decent forwards within the league.
But this weekend, that could change. Andik himself spoke of how this is the perfect opportunity for them to seek revenge. But it’s more than just that. Revenge will inherently lead to confidence, and that will only help in getting Selangor’s season back on track.
There’s two clear benefits to this. Firstly, Felda are high on confidence following their excellent start to the season and knocking them out of the FA Cup, which is a clear opportunity to claim silverware, will only put a dent on their morale. But beyond that, Selangor themselves need to destroy the demons that are still haunting them from that 4-0 loss last year.
Whether they would be able to actually accomplish it; not that’s a different dilemma. Per contra, it’s pretty evident that Durakovic needs to rally his troops for this one and a victory, could perhaps be the turning point for them this year. After all, confidence does wonders in football. Ask Safee Sali, he’ll tell you all about it.
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