Kuching FA has every reason and right to feel disappointed with the promotion of Perlis Nothern Lions.
Kuching which finished the Liga FAM 2018 as fourth in Group A, had earlier said that they are disappointed with the Malaysia Football League’s (MFL) decision to promote Perlis as they felt it was unfair.
Kuching had applied to play in the Liga Premier next season through the special promotion offered by MFL to one Liga FAM team.
While Kuching claimed that they aren’t too happy about the promotion due to the fact Perlis still has outstanding salaries to former players, we did more digging.
Eventually we found out that Perlis actually ranked fifth (last) in Group B, and only collected four points from the eight matches they played last season in the league. They only won once and were defeated six times!
Kuching in contrast played 12 matches and collected 18 points in Group A, winning five of their matches.
The table below shows the final table of the FAM League.
Now, MFL had said that they promoted Perlis with certain terms, but from where we are standing, we understand Kuching’s frustration over the issue – A team which is lower ranked than them had been promoted over them, despite having outstanding salary issues.
Perlis did do a good job with their new management and we really like what is introduced in Perlis. We did say this and we stand by it.
However, their sudden rise from being the bottom of the Liga FAM to a Liga Premier outfit, thanks to the ‘special promotion’ by MFL can be seen as being ‘a bit too special’, even for observers.This is especially true since they still do technically owe money and had been given 60 days to settle the issue.
That said, we do hope MFL would properly clarify the matter and let the public know of why Kuching didn’t get the special promotion despite their better standings and the fact that they didn’t have any issues at the management level.
As far as we know, Kuching also doesn’t have any salary issues last season and is one of the most financially stable team by far from Sarawak.
