Kick in the guts
Malaysia go down in shootout
THE gloomy skies in Hanoi summed up Malaysia’s night after football’s bronze medal playoff against Indonesia.
The Harimau Muda, who wanted to make up for the heartbreaking semi-final loss to the hosts, missed several gilt-edged chances and could have beaten their opponents in regulation time.
Instead, they had to undergo the harrowing penalty shootout and the Indonesians prevailed 4-3 at the My Dinh Stadium in Hanoi yesterday.
The match which was played on a wet pitch, had ended 1-1 with the Garudas’ Ronaldo Kwateh scoring the opener in the 70th minute before Malaysia equalised 10 minutes later through Hadi Fayyadh Abdul Razak.
Hadi and Luqman Hakim Shamsuddin missed the first and third penalty while Indonesia’s naturalised midfielder Marc Klok broke Malaysians hearts with the winner.
Coach Brad Maloney said although the loss was painful, he wants his boys to put the defeat behind them and regroup for the Under-23 Asian Cup in Uzbekistan next month.
“Penalty is always like a lottery. Tonight, we played brilliantly, created lots of chances but the ball just won’t go in.
“I believe if the game went into extra time, we could have nicked it as Luqman and Hadi were getting more dangerous upfront,” said the Australian.
“But that’s the tournament regulation. It is what it is.
“I cannot fault the boys’ commitment. From start to finish, they have done themselves proud and showed they could fight against sides who opted for overaged players.”
The defeat meant that the footballers failed to pick up a medal at the Games for the second consecutive time after Datuk Ong Kim Swee’s squad took the silver in the 2017 Kuala Lumpur edition.