Skip to main content

Kim Swee keeps faith in Kenny


INJURIES and suspensions to the national Under-21 team's defenders mean newcomer Kenny Pallraj will continue to deputise at the back when Malaysia meet Thailand in the Thanh Nien Newspaper Cup semi-finals in Gia Lai, Vietnam today.

Kenny, a midfielder from Perak, was fielded as an emergency centreback in Malaysia's 4-2 win over Sydney FC in a Group B match on Wednesday and did enough to convince coach Ong Kim Swee to retain him for the semi-finals.

It was Malaysia's second win in the Under-21 tournament after also beating Laos by the same score.
With Syazuan Tajuddin, Fandi Othman and Azrif Nasrulhaq Badrul Hisham all unavailable, Kim Swee has been forced to reshuffle his defence with another midfielder, Ariff Farhan Md Isa, also set to fill in at right-back.

Midfielders Ariff and Adam Nor Azlin, both 16, and Kenny all impressed against Sydney though Armed Forces striker Syazuan Hazani struggled to adapt and was replaced at half-time by Ahmad Hazwan Bakri.

"This is the best time to test and analyse the young boys," said Kim Swee who is preparing a squad to defend the Sea Games gold next year.

"Adam really outshone the rest, he did not panic and did not place himself under pressure. Ariff has been in and out of the team but gave a very consistent performance.

"I had no choice but to play Kenny as a centre-back and he did well. I will probably play him against Thailand again because of the injuries and suspensions that we have.

"Syazuan will need to get used to the tempo although he tried hard after suddenly finding himself playing at this level."

Kim Swee is set to restore Hazwan and Irfan Fazail to the first XI against Thailand, who finished second in Group A after going down 2-0 to Vietnam. By Devinder Singh

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