Skip to main content

Football: Frustrated referees want meeting with FAM president

SOME national referees, fed-up with Lt Col (Rtd) Kamaruddin Sakhari -- the head of their department -- are seeking an audience with FA of Malaysia president Sultan Ahmad Shah to vent their frustration.

The referees department, since last year, has come under fire from the media for the unprofessional way it has dealt with some of its members.

This year, some referees whose credentials are questionable, have been assigned to local league matches. Appointments of match commissioners and referees inspectors have also been criticised.

"We are sick and tired with FAM (for not looking into the matter). We have complained on numerous occasions and have even written to FAM, but until today we have not received any feedback, and the same person is allowed to manage the department," said a current Fifa referee who did not want to be identified.

Things took a turn for the worse when a Singapore official, who is also an Asian Football Confederation (AFC) staff member, was appointed as the match commissioner for a recent Premier League match. Also, there were appointments of referees which were not justified, not to mention officials arriving late for matches. All this has been very frustrating for some referees.
The late Nazri Abdullah, who was also the FAM referee's committee chairman, had expressed his disappointment and had met with FAM general secretary Lt Jen (rtd) Datuk Azzuddin Ahmad and informed him that the department had to be revamped.

Even referees committee deputy chairman Datuk Soh Chin Aun agreed that the head of the referees department cannot be doing as he pleases.

"We have rules and regulations and that must be followed. We want to progress," said Chin Aun.

Despite Chin Aun's assurance that something will be done regarding the matter, there are unhappy individuals who contacted Timesport to express their disappointment.

It is understood that about 70 referees have signed a letter of protest which is expected to be delivered to the FAM president next week.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ex-coach's jail sentence cut to a year

PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal yesterday sentenced former athletics coach C. Ramanathan to 12 months' jail for molesting two junior athletes 19 years ago. A three-man bench led by Datuk Mohd Hishamudin Mohd Yunus unanimously dismissed Ramanathan's appeal against conviction, but varied the jail sentence of four years to a year, which was to run concurrently. Following yesterday's ruling, Ramanathan, 75, a former teacher, walked out a free man as he had served 10 months in Kajang Prison. Convicts get one-third remission for good behaviour while in prison. However, he will lose his pension. Hishamudin, who sat with Datuk Abdul Wahab Patail and Datuk Linton Albert, said the court found no merit to overturn the conviction. "However, in reducing the sentence, we considered Ramanathan's age and the long years the appeal has taken." Deputy public prosecutor Awang Armadajaya Awang Mahmud submitted that then High Court judge Tan Sri Abdull Hamid E...
2 comments
Read more

Badminton: Fans rooting for all-Malaysian semis

Reports: RAJES PAUL KUALA LUMPUR: The home fans will be rooting for an all-Malaysian men’s singles semi-final between Lee Chong Wei and Liew Daren. But Chong Wei is more fancied to advance than Daren in quarter-final matches against Indonesian Simon Santoso and Dane Peter Gade-Christensen respectively at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil today. Yesterday, Chong Wei defeated Vietnamese Nguyen Tien Minh 21-9, 18-21, 21-7 in a second-round match that saw the world number one struggling to adapt to the draught in the stadium in the second game. And Daren continued a fairy tale run in his home Open, blowing away a toothless Hsueh Hsuan-yi of Taiwan 21-14, 21-12. Although Choong Wei had to slog for the win over Tien Minh, the top seed and defending champion felt that he was playing better by the day. “I got off to a good start but found it hard to cope with the draught. I tried to catch up after losing my momentum but that did not happen and I decided to conserve energy for ...
11 comments
Read more

Rajagobal Let Off The Hook

PETALING JAYA, April 24 (Bernama) -- National head coach Datuk K. Rajagobal was let off the hook by the Football Association of Malaysia's (FAM) Disciplinary Committee after finding no evidence that he had violated FAM's Article 88, as claimed. FAM Disciplinary Committee chairman Datuk Taufik Abdul Razak said the committee had decided not to charge Rajagobal after carefully analysing the video of the post-match press conference by the 56-year-old coach. "After listening to the recording of the post-match press conference, we decided to drop the charge against Rajagopal as he did not make such a statement. "Maybe his (Rajagobal) assessment and comments of the match was misconstrued by the media. There was no mention of the FAM policy throughout his comments," said Taufik after emerging from a three-hour Disciplinary Committee meeting at Wisma FAM in Kelana Jaya, here, Wednesday. Rajagobal who does not mince his words when asked to com...
4 comments
Read more