Singapore’s ‘Messi Mania’ amid a dismal defeat makes us all look ridiculous
If football fans worried more about their Lions than a 10-second glimpse of a jet-lagged Lionel Messi, Singapore might not lose crucial home matches to relative minnows like Taiwan, argues Neil Humphreys…
Quick, he’s at the airport. He’s coming down the escalator. He’s on the coach. Or at least there’s a grainy shot of a bleary-eyed, bearded bloke on the coach. It must be him. He must be here.
Lionel Messi is here in Singapore. He’s playing. He’s actually playing! He’s deigned us worthy of his presence to play in an exhibition that has all the sporting gravitas of Muhammad Ali grappling with Japanese wrestler Antonio Inoki at the Nippon Budokan.
How could (Messi) be a professional footballer against a side that had just lost to Taiwan in an AFC Asian Cup qualifier?
But cynicism be damned. Messi is here. It’s official. ‘Messi Mania’ is official. That’s what it was called in the media so it must be official.
There are airport selfies and salivating officials, a handful of placard-waving stragglers on the ECP and the kind of bladder-bursting excitement not seen on social media since One Direction turned up at the National Stadium.
This is bigger than Harry Styles, a real sign of the times for Singapore football. Messi is coming after all and a nation rushes as one to change its underwear.
And then, Messi isn’t coming.
Gonzalo Higuain and Nicolas Otamendi aren’t coming either, but they are incidental characters in a superstar’s story. They are mere footballers. On their day, they are rather talented footballers. Higuain veers towards the exceptional.
The shock Taiwan loss has been swept aside among Messi mania
But what has football got to do with the cult of celebrity?
Messi was expected to be the ringmaster in a circus masquerading as a football fixture, but he wisely took his ball and went home to prepare for his wedding.
Meanwhile, Singapore’s national under-15 football side has just been defeated 12-0. That’s not a typo
He had no time for a marriage of inconvenience at National Stadium, expected to be a performing monkey first and a professional footballer second.
How could he be a professional footballer against a side that had just lost to Taiwan in an AFC Asian Cup qualifier?
That match, a real match with sporting ramifications that actually mattered, got lost in the Messi ‘mania’.
But the Messi farce underlined Singapore's fickle reputation for being a country with not a sports culture, but a sports groupie culture, eagerly turning up for exhibitions or tournaments in football, tennis and golf without putting in the hard yards required to produce top sportspeople of our own.
Everyone has been on Messi watch, FFT included
While a nation could barely contain itself at the prospect of a jet-lagged Messi wandering around Kallang, with one eye on the clock and the other on the exit, the Lions failed to overcome the honest toilers from Taiwan.
While we turned into hormonal teenagers at a Taylor Swift gig, giddy at the blurry images of Messi on a bus, Singapore sailors Griselda Khng and Olivia Chen admitted they lacked the funding needed to train for the 2020 Olympics.
They turned to crowdfunding to pay for their overseas training stints and had raised just half of their $25,000, a pitiful amount that wouldn’t pay for first-class tickets for a couple of Argentines from Melbourne to Singapore.
Meanwhile, Singapore’s national under-15 football side has just been defeated 12-0.
That’s not a typo. That’s 12 goals. Their opponents were not Argentina, Germany, Spain or France, but next-door neighbours Indonesia.
For a bona fide sports culture, a more appropriate way to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the Football Association of Singapore (FAS) might be to address the systemic reasons behind these humiliating results.
Year-round grassroots activities, nationwide junior tournaments, from futsal to full-size pitches, culminating with the finals being played and trophies awarded at the National Stadium, might have been a more fitting and rewarding way to recognise the 125th anniversary.
Argentina are hot property in Singapore, but at what cost?
Such events wouldn’t make the headlines perhaps or indeed generate huge revenues for third-party advertisers and media companies, but they might do what it actually says on the FAS tin: develop the game’s grassroots in an organised, sustainable way.
That’s a sports culture. The trouble is it’s not particularly sexy in a KPI culture obsessed with grand plans that tick boxes, appease impatient bosses and guarantee year-end bonuses.
It’s instant gratification for the Instagram generation. But in football terms, the positives are dubious at best.
So the FAS will celebrate its 125th anniversary with a one-sided farce against a half-strength Argentina killing time until they can stock up on the Duty Free and retreat to private South American beaches.
It’s these kinds of exhibitions – and our gushing response to them – that reinforce Singapore’s unwanted reputation of being a soft touch for international event management firms; a first-world economy with a third-world sports infrastructure, an easy place to make some quick cash between domestic seasons that actually involve real competition.
What can a friendly between a Singapore side still smarting from an unexpected loss to Taiwan and an uninterested Argentina side realistically achieve?
In economic terms, there is plenty. A packed National Stadium is always welcome, in any circumstances. Around 50,000 fans turning out to watch a match involving the Lions is always a cause for celebration.
It's hard to begrudge Messi his swift exit. Photo: FAS
In celebrity terms, Kallang promises to be a sea of shining selfies, a night of flashing lights at every throw-in and corner close-up. It’s instant gratification for the Instagram generation.
But in football terms, the positives are dubious at best.
If Argentina play at full strength, they threaten a rugby score, which will humiliate their hosts. If the visitors hold back to keep the score respectable, they’ll humiliate their hosts.
Privately, a couple of former Lions have shared their frustration of watching a half-paced Manchester United knock the ball around them at the old National Stadium in 2001.
Facing Fabien Barthez as a winger, rather than a goalkeeper, was not an amusing distraction, but a genuine source of embarrassment.
Hopefully, the Argentines will meet somewhere in the middle to ensure a credible occasion that is neither feast nor famine.
Whatever the outcome, the result will have almost no bearing on Singapore’s football future. The losses against Taiwan and the teenaged Indonesians are of far greater significance.
But never let facts get in the way of a real Messi story.
Singapore’s football remains woeful, but hey, we’re still a rich country. We can still improve.
Maybe next year we can get Cristiano Ronaldo to visit Changi Airport.
https://www.fourfourtwo.com/my/feat...-a-dismal-defeat-makes-us-all-look-ridiculous