Philippines-Indonesia Preview: The Red & White Tide

This appears in the Tuesday December 14, 2010 edition of the Business Mirror.

The Red & White Tide

The Merah Putih or Indonesia’s national football team can’t wait to host the Azkals in their personal shop of horrors called the Bung Karno Stadium. By Rick Olivares with pics from AFF website.

In the film Jurassic Park, a live cow was lowered into the Velociraptor pen for the regular feeding of the newly cloned bipedal carnivores. The cow was devoured in a matter of seconds.

While that gory scene is from the mind of author Michael Crichton and director Steven Speilberg, the analogy is not lost on many Indonesian football fans when the Philippine National Men’s Football Team enters its den, the cavernous Gelora Bung Karno Stadium in Central Jakarta, for a pair of matches in the semifinals round of the 2010 Suzuki Cup on December 16 and 19.

The Bung Karno Stadium is the 12^th largest stadium in the world and has a seating capacity for 100,000 people but due to renovations in 2007, it now seats only 88,083 people. Team Philippines isn’t only going up against the Indonesian XI but 88,083 people hollering their national team’s every volley and missed chance.

This year, on the home field at the Bung Karno Stadium, the Merah Putih, as the Indonesian nationals are called, is 5-2 (they also play elsewhere and out of the country) and has amassed 22 goals against the 12 they’ve given up.

Their two loses show that are beatable at home. Now before you get all giddy about the Philippines’ chances know that those two loses were to Uruguay (#7) and Oman (#81), two countries ranked significantly higher than Indonesia’s FIFA standing of #135.

Perhaps more tellingly, against the Philippines, the Red and Whites are a robust 16-1-0 (wins, draws, loses), they have a total of 78 goals against seven.

In the Suzuki Cup Group A final rounds competition held from December 1-8, 2010 at the Bung Karno with Thailand, Malaysia, and Laos, Indonesia won all three matches to tally the full nine points while amassing a tournament-best 13 goals while giving up only two for a goal differential of 11.

They had five players who scored two goals each in Irfan Bachdim, Muhammad Ridwan, Arif Suyono, Firman Utina, and Bambang Pamungkas.

In contrast, the Philippines scored only three goals and gave up one. Two of the Azkals’ scores came from midfielder Chris Greatwich.

The Indonesians have ironically yet to win the Suzuki Cup. They have made the finals three consecutive times from 2000-2004 where they lost the first two to Thailand and the last to Singapore. The Indons also know that hosting the finals doesn’t guarantee a win as they lost in 2002.

Their finals record of futility notwithstanding, Indonesian media and fans are expecting to walk all over the seemingly overmatched Philippines.

But the Merah Putih’s Austrian head coach Alfred Riedl cautioned against complacency last weekend to the Indonesian media. “There’s no such thing as a free lunch. At this stage, all teams have an equal chance of winning the tournament. If we want to win this, my players must make the best of their chances and to treat the first match against the Philippines as ‘an away leg. Playing both semifinal legs in front of our home crowd will give us more pressure as fans expect us to win both games. We saw that with Vietnam against the Philippines.”

Aside from redemption for Indonesia, one factor fueling the Merah Putih’s drive is vindication for Riedl who was the head coach of Vietnam before he was fired (and replaced by current head coach Henrique Calisto) after the 2007 SEA Games after the squad went 2-2 and gave up five more goals. Now he has them once more on the cusp of a Suzuki Finals berth against possibly Vietnam which is expected to easily get past Malaysia which struggled in Group A play and finished with only four points.

Home field pressure aside, Riedl hopes to have a healthy crew in time for the semifinals. Last Saturday, playmaker Firman Utina who heads a superb midfield line, and defender Zulkifli Syukur both suffered minor knee injuries during a training session yet were able to train with the team on Sunday. The Austrian insisted that Firman will be 100% for Thursday’s match with the Philippines.

Said Niko Lim, a Filipino who resided in Indonesia for much of his youth, The likes of Irfan, naturalized Uruguayan striker Christian Gonzales and midfielder Oktavianus are very worthy additions. Their attack is a lot more dangerous due to these three guys. Although there are a lot of new guys, they have retained Bambang Pamungkas and Firman. Bambang is a superstar; he's treated like god in Jakarta but we have seen that Gonzales is taking more of the scoring role in this AFF Cup.”

Philippines striker remembers Bambang quite well, “He once scored five goals against us (in a 13-1 rout 2003). He may be older but that doesn’t make him any less dangerous.”

Notes: The most expensive ticket to the semifinals of the 2010 Suzuki Cup costs IDR 350,000 Rupiah or PhP 1,693.00. The cheapest ticket costs IDR 50,000 or PhP 242.00.