Soccer federation needs restructuring: Critic
Soccer federation needs restructuring: Critic
JAKARTA (JP): The All Indonesia Soccer Federation (PSSI) needs
restructuring, a senior official of the association said
yesterday.
Kamaruddin Panggabean, a member of the PSSI advisory board,
was offering his opinion for PSSI's 31st congress, to be opened
this morning by Vice President Try Sutrisno at the Pondok Gede
Haj Pilgrimage Dormitory in East Jakarta.
The two-day congress may become somewhat critical for the
incumbent PSSI chairman Azwar Anas, who is also Minister for
People's Welfare, following the 1-0 defeat by Vietnam of the
national team at the just concluded 18th Southeast Asian Games in
Chiang Mai, Thailand. The upset denied Indonesia a semifinal
berth.
"The restructuring covers both administration and organization
sectors. These measures include a removal of figures who are
unfamiliar with the people," the 76-year-old man said.
Kamaruddin said that a number of failures in international
events implied that the soccer body failed to run its
administration well.
During Azwar's four-year tenure, Indonesia flopped at the 29th
Asian under-19 soccer championship here last year. The national
team also failed to qualify for the Olympic Games after two
losses to South Korea.
To add insult to injury, Persib, the champion of the
Indonesian League, suffered a drubbing in the 15th Asian Club
championship quarterfinals before its home fans last month.
Kamaruddin criticized Azwar for having little control over
what his subordinates did. Citing an example, Kamaruddin said
PSSI could not avoid choosing "a wrong coach" whom he blamed for
the national team's falter in the SEA Games.
"I would rather hire a world-class coach, such as Rinus
Michael, for US$600,000 a year to train as many as our local
coaches, not our booters. By doing so, his knowledge would reside
with our coaches, which would be more effective," he said.
Kamaruddin also criticized the selection of national SEA Games
team which surprisingly picked no players from the Indonesian
league champion Persib. "This would never happen anywhere else in
the world," he said.
Kamaruddin, one of the PSSI's staunchest critics, expressed
his concern that money and sponsorship had influenced PSSI to
give the go-ahead to the Italian project called Primavera.
The project, initiated two years ago, sent 20 young booters to
Italy to train in the Italian youth league for two years.
"The program cannot reach out to hundreds of our booters,
which may be more talented than the selected 20."
Kamaruddin, who has been with PSSI since 1949, however, said
that although he did not find Azwar a good leader, Azwar deserves
a second chance. (arf)