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This is starting to get very interesting. I was sitting quietly at a cafe in Ho Chi Minh City airport waiting for my flight to Singapore when I received this email from Edmund Lee, together with the following photo. I just had to post it up immediately. Apologies for any typos (which I will correct later) ...
Standing (L to R)
Cikgu Bujang Hadi (Coach/Manager), Joseph Jinggut (Captain - Midfield), Steven "Ferrari" Joseph (winger), Dublin "Iron-man" Unting (Full-back), John Dawi (reserve), Mathew Chin (with specs, partly hidden - reserve), Morshidi "Steady" Gani (full-back), Jonathan "Striker" Nanang (Centre-forward), Sudarsono "long-man" Osman (Centre-Back), Rev Bro Columba.
Front Row
Abdul Rahim (reserve), Abdillah "speedy" Adam ( Winger ), Dennis "Gordon Banks" Liew (Goalkeeper), Awang Abdullah (left back), Osman Abdul Rani (Mid-field), Soedirman Aini (forward)
Excerpt of Edmund's email follows ...
"... follow-up on the chance-meeting with Cikgu Bujang and posting on our School's Football Teams of the '70s, especially the Team of 1973 which spearheaded St. Joseph's School dominance in the Inter-School Football arena - Champions for 3 consecutive years, 1973, 74 and 75.
Cikgu met up with a few of us this morning over breakfast and what was initially thought of as a short & quick meeting carried through for another two hours.....with Cikgu sharing nostalgic memories of life in the heydays of St. Joseph's.
What was even more impressive was that Cikgu told us that he spent more time in school than at home - from his normal teaching routine to the much-looked-forward-to training on the football pitch. He mentioned that his greatest challenge was not the lack of players but the sadness in excluding some potenially good and committed students from the team because he could only register 16 players. Such was the pool of talent available and the enthusiasm of these students to don the school colours...that's St. Joseph's.
And Cikgu also shared a very touching, yet interesting part of his personal life....his marriage. His wedding party, to be more precise. We were astounded when he mentioned that his best man was a CHINESE ! Yes, a Chinese as a best man in a Malay wedding !! Would you believe that ? And that Chinese best man was non other than his buddy and colleague - Mr. Anthony Goh, our school's renowned athletics coach extra-ordinaire.That's REALLY 1Msia - a Christian Chinese as best man at a Muslim friend's wedding !
Unfortunately, Cikgu was unable to produce a photograph of that "historic" occasion, as the best man was too busy ushering the guests. (multi-tasking, I guess )
Kudos, Cikgu for your magnanimity and humility. No wonder you were ( and still are ) held in such high regard and respect among the students during your tenure in St. Joseph's.
Back to the Team photo - the famous sons of 1973 ...
For the record, the Team beat our arch-rivals St. Thomas' School 2-0 in the replayed final match. The first match ended in a stale-mate. ( 1-1 )
Let's hear it from some of our brother Josephians who were there when it happened....be it in school or during the tournament itself.
Do we still recall the Monday school assemblies when Bro Columba presented trophies or awards for achievements ? Were you one of the lucky few who were priviledged enough to walk up those steps to the stage to receive your awards?
The feeling must be "out of this world" as fellow school-mates gave you an ovation when your name was announced. That's the spirit inculcated in us and the environment that we went through - regular bonding and a great camaraderie among this band of brothers. We ate, we talked, we slept, we dressed "St. Joseph's" That distinguished us from other schools - we had "THE JOSEPHIAN SPIRIT" "Ora Et Labora"
Cheers and have a Great and Blessed Weekend."
Thanks Edmund. This third report seals your reputation as the "Football Correspondent" for the Josephians of the Seventies blog. I have no doubt this is just the start of the "Football Chronicles"....
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ELAS and James Yong. Now, you are finally talking my language! Elas, I thought that St. Joe won more championships than those 3 years that was mentioned here. I'm 4 years younger than you guys but we had great football teams led by none other than the great John Lee and Jnauary. I was a reserve on those teams but for for some reason, I cannot recall if St Joe won any championships in the years, after you guys. Must be getting old. Most of the guys "graduated" to play for Pandungan United which was the dominant local team at the time. ELAS, did any of our players ever made the Sarawak team? Cikgu was our coach but there was this great player assisting him all the time. I think his name is Mohammed Abdul Rahman? He has a younger brother called Wan Abdul Rahman? Man, I'm sorry if I cannot remember a lot of the names. Thanks, guys. My name is Alex shim.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the added memories, Alex.
ReplyDeleteyou stay in Rock View, Alex?
ReplyDeleteAbang Abdulrahman, SJS player went on to captain Sarawak team.
ReplyDeleteHi Alex...Alex Shim..bro..finally you surfaced ! Where are you now ? Yes, the good old days...and the Rockview Estate boys..your bro Harry and sisters Helen and..was it Annie ? Those unforgettable times during Chinese New year. I believe you did play for Padungan United, right ? You were a good player then though a bit "soft"...clean-type guy whom the referee found it hard to pull out the yellow card ! heehehe.
ReplyDeleteThat guy is Abang Abdul Rahman...Cikgu's protege and school captain in 1975. He went on to captain Sarawak. Now a single-handicapper golfer. Bumps into him now and then.
I did pose the question to Cikgu about Januari, John Lee, Clarence Chai, Basil Sim,and a few more. Cikgu mentioned that apart from winning the Inter-Primary series, that Team never achieved its full potential..probably there was more individual flair than Teamwork. Sounds familiar, right ?
Hope you'll comment more on our postings. Have to go...Spurs/Liverpool match waiting...
Cheers and God Bless !
Alot of people forgot that Pandungan United comprises of mostly St Joes's players from that "Juventus" club team, an entire team of students from St Joe that's 3 years junior from you guys. During the late 70's, the two greatest players that I ever saw in Kuching was Abang Abdul Rahman and captain of Pandungan, Lee Hock Peng aka "Tuklu'(Baldy). Alas, there were no pro team then. cos' I'm quite sure both of them would be stars. ELAS, you had a younger brother who played for the Crusaders led by Peter Pui of Pui Nam Cheong. I'm sorry if I forget his name but he was a good player too. I've played against him numerous times during pickup games at St. Joe.
ReplyDeleteRemember "Arrow" from Padungan, what a player, fast & furious, hence his nickname.
ReplyDeleteAh See, that game was unforgettable, the mother of all battles.
ReplyDeleteThe atmosphere was electrifying, to see Stephen Joseph weaving through the defenders and score..i still can recall that moment but alas i have not met him for many years.
Those names you mentioned are SJS football greats, though i must add a number of them are imports, they came to SJS to study and quickly assimilated to our culture and were accepted as one of our own. Greenians like Jonathan Nanang. Abdillah...is he a Greenian? Denis Liew from Miri, the maestro, masterminding from behind.Wonder why Pek Eng ( Saperi Rambli, anither very good player ) is not in. Of course our very own homebred players, notably towering Sudarsono and Joe Jinggut plus Othman Rani, Soediman and Morshidi. Stephen Joseph reminds me of Mario Kempes,the flamboyant Argentinian. They form the backbone of the team. Wow. What an assemblage of football greats.
Thanks Edmund for your article and to James for hosting all these.
Tiger, seems that Ah See has mistaken you for somebody else huh?
ReplyDeleteHe mistook you for David Shim I think.....or Daniel Shim?
Hurray to Rockview Rovers!
From: Othman Abdul Rani
ReplyDeleteDate: Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 4:09 PM
Subject: RE: St Joseph's Football Team 1973
To: Edmund Lee
Edmund, thank you for the mail and after reading it and seeing the photograph of the Football squad it quickly bring good memories in the 70’s. First of all I am not Abdul Rahim Colex but Othman Abdul Rani, the elder brother of Sazali Abdul Rani at CMS Cement. Our squard full backs are now the ‘full back’of our state government ie. Now Datuk Amar Morshidi Gani, the State Sec.,Datu Sudarsono-the state Land and Survey Director and our midfielder Soedirman Aini is now the Permanent Sec.in Ministry of Social and Sport.In 1975 final we beat Openg Secondary school by 1 nil at the jublee ground.
Daniel Shim is Harry Shims' brother.
ReplyDeleteThere's 2 Shim families at Rockview as far as I now.
Hi Brothers of St. Joe ...so happy to see the responses. And the comments too....great ! Thanks for adding spice, colour and life to our blog...what good is a football team if there were no supporters.
ReplyDeleteNL: you're right. I mistook tiger for Daniel Shim..now I know who he is...Shim Sian Feng or something like that.. a handful then as he was a real slippery customer for most full-backs.
And also great to have one of the '73 stars commenting on our posting...that's Othman Abdul Rani whom I'm referring to. Thanks, Othman for your views and feedback. Most welcome...perhaps you can help to get Datuk Amar Morshidi and Datuk Sudarsono too...afterall, he's the President of Persatuan Bola Sepak Sarawak...very appropriate.
And Vernon...I really like your "mother of all battles" comment...sounds like the Thomians meeting their Waterloo in the hands of Lord Wellington.
Thanks again, WSJ for your prompt action and time. We may be the candles...but you are providing the light.
Cheers and take care !
Othman,thanks for your updates and suggestions for a reunion of the football greats. We'll keep an open mind...Dato Anthony Bujang will surely look forward to that...and Datuk Justine too..
ReplyDeleteBy the way, you are not doing too badly either...CEO/ED of CMS Cement. Now we know who to look for when we need extra semen...sorry, I mean cement.
Cheers and please keep the comments coming. I have another very interesting subject to share...an auspicious event in the "good ole days at St. Joseph's"...WSJ's still editing it...
Regards, Edmund.
Hello ELAS and James. I just want to venture off about St joe's football but more into the World Cup. ELAS, we were watching the World Cup bidding live here in United States with about a hundred other Americans in a drinking place at 8 am when they announced Qatar as the host country for 2022 World Cup. Qatar?? Everybody was shocked and stunned. USA, with all its wonderful stadiums and money was the heavy fav. to snag the 2022 World Cup. So, what went wrong? ELAS, do you think that Qatar, the size of Sarawak, with a population of 1.7 million would make sense to host the World Cup. I mean, the fans are going to be more than the population. I was hoping that England would get the 2018 cos' it would be an excuse for me to visit England and watch my dream-come-true World Cup games and my beloved Stoke City matches before I retire home to Kuching in about 15 years. I guess I just have to hope that China or Australia gets it when I'm 70 years old in Kuching and try to make it to the ganes over there. ELAS, any thoughts as far as if it make any sense that Qatar got to be the host? I'm still in shock.
ReplyDeleteWhile I was equally shocked that Qatar won the bid for 2022, Russia's successful bid to host the 2018 World Cup was not surprising.
ReplyDeleteEngland and USA lost for apparently different reasons. England showed too much confidence..arrogance at times.And their allegations of fraud and "fixing/irregularities" did not go down well with many of the delegates..especially the innocent ones.
USA ? - somehow..we still haven't quite associate football with USA and it appears to be reflected in the delegates' thinking too. Golf, tennis, basketball perhaps...but USA needs more convincing to host the Football World Cup.
And Qatar - what can we say ? I, for one, didn't even thought they would have survived the first round of voting when they announced their bid for the 2022 series.
But when AFC Supremo Hamman went public with his backing for Qatar (his home country), Blatter must have quietly given his blessings...it's the "behind-the-scenes" things that usually tilt the scales...
I wouldn't mind saying that Qatar's success signifies a "Middle-East" victory and more Arab $$$$ into FIFA's coffers. Blatter is a businessman, not a footballer. Football is now a global business concern.
Mark my words...China will also be on FIFA's radar screen....
My parting thoughts..what'll Qatar do with the stadiums after the 2022 World Cup ?..I believe South Africa is at wits end to fill its stadiums after this year's World Cup...and holding massive clearance sales for vuvuzelas !
By the way, did you watch Samir Nasri's two wonder goals for Arsenal last night ? Sublime, artistic, classy...the goals that football fans drool over..when Nasri's on song..Arsenal sails along. My favourite EPL player..and he's getting better !
Cheers !
SSF aka rockviewtiger,
ReplyDeletewhy shouldn't Qatar (and Russia) host the World Cup?
Afterall USA had already hosted it 1994.
And does size matters? Who knows, Singapore (much much smaller than Qatar) may one day get to host it.
Cheers!
What if Israel qualifies for 2022 World Cup?
ReplyDeleteLeo: anything can happen.I won't be surprised if Israel qualifies in 2022.
ReplyDeleteMy Dream Final: Israel Vs Palestine
Referee: USA
Linemen: 1 from Afghanistan, 1 from Iran.
Then the World will learn that sports UNITE, while politics DIVIDE !
Let's dream !!!!
Non-football fan 10.45 am : Would be good if FIFA sets ground rules that smaller nations should co-host rather going it alone. This will involve more nations. Also solves the problem of "under-utilised" stadiums after the World Cup is over.
ReplyDeleteAlso, good to spread the venue among the continents. I believe this may be one of the reasons Russia got the 2018 job.
Only countries that had qualified for previous World Cups should be given the job - to ensure good attendances at matches. Automatic qualification as hosts may backfire if the hosts get thrashed and exit early.However FIFA seem to view this as an insignificant factor.
Some countries are good at hosting tournaments - like China...and even Malaysia. But I believe Singapore will not go for it..they are a practical country..too much wastage just to build stadiums for a one month show and later become while elephants.
Hello guys. This is Alex Shim aka rockviewtiger, obviously. I don't quite know how to put "Alex Shim' on the headline as it keeps coming up "Rockviewtiger" on my goggle account. Israel was put into the European Federation of football for obvious reasons, as all the other Arab Muslim countries are in the Asian Football Federation. You cannot have these countries and Israel playing each other on a regular basis due to the high security concerns. Israel is complaining that this isn't fair cos' it's almost impossible for them to qualify for the World Cup while Saudi Arabia, UAE has a better chance even though they are weaker footballing teams. Australia, with its billionaire supporter, manage to get out of the Oceania Federation (they have to go through South America) and into Asia cos' it would be easier to qualify. I regretted not going to any matches during the 1994 WC. The final between Brazil and Italy was practically played in my backyard in Los Angeles.It's not that easy to travel for WC matches unless one is financially stable. Most of us have to make great sacrifices to attend these matches.
ReplyDeleteELAS, I left during what I thought was Malaysia's greatest mpoment, qualifying for the 80 Olympics in Moscow. The late Dahari, Santokh Singh, "Towkay", "Spiderman", James Wong etc. Was there another better Malaysian team after that? James Yaakub was our lone Sarawak rep. Has there been any other Sarawak players on the National team? Surely, some of the "Nyap Sayot" players would qualify.
Same theme but different note. Eric Clapton is scheduled to perfrom in Singapore on Feb 14 2011. For those whoe could afford it, I highy recommend going cos' you are looking at a living musical genius with the guitar. Hendrix, David Gilmore (Pink Floyd), Clapton, they make the guitar "come to life", that's what separate the greats from others. For most of our generation, this is again, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Thanks, guys.
Affendi Julaihi (winger) played for the national team. A few other Ngap Sayoters were reserves on the national team as well.
ReplyDeleteTalking of the Ngap Sayot days, Jalil Ramli (captain) was famous for his long throw-in. Even scored a goal from once from his throw-ins.
Alex Shim aka rockviewtiger: That '80 Team was Malaysia's finest although many also argued that the 1972 Olympics Team didn't look out of place either - with greats like Chow Chee Keong, Namat Abdullah,Soh Chin Aun,Wong Chun Wah,Santokh Singh, Syed Ahmad, M. Chandran,Wong Kam Fook, Ali Bakar, Harun Jusoh, Shaharudin Abdullah.
ReplyDeleteLost to W Germany 3-0, Morocco 6-0 but beat USA 3-0 ( yes, we beat the USA )- Our highly-rated goalkeeper, Chow Chee Keong went on to play professionally in Hong Kong in the late 70s and early 80s
Best Football Player from Sarawak....I'll go for Mohd Ali Sapiee.
Best Guitarist : my choice is Hank Marvin of "The Shadows" - he makes the guitar talk !
Hello again, a little bit of a follow-up to yesterday's comment. ELAS, you might remember late 70's, Singapore and Malaysia were the best in SEA Asia. Malaysia competed well against the Middle East countries like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Asian country like S Korea but our greatest rivalry was with Singapore. Quah Kim Song, Mohammed Nor, Rajagopal (banana corner kicks) and later Fandi Ahmad. Uncle Choo was their coach. I'm guessing both countries fell into hard times. Who are the new powers in SEA Asia?
ReplyDeleteA little bit of follow-up to yesterday's comment. Late 70's, I thought was the greatest period of Malaysian football. I could be wrong as I left the country in 1980 but I don't seem to hear Malaysia winning anything in football. Our greatest rivalry was with Singapore. Their two best players in history, Quah Kim Song and Fandi Ahmad were simply amazing. There's also Mohammed Nor, Rajagopal (banana corner kicks) and coach, Uncle Choo. Both countries would regularly beat the Middle east powerhouses like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and occassionaly, South Korea, a momentus situation beating them to qualify for the 80 olympics at Merdeka Stadium. 2-1 score?? James Wong scores?? Quite possibly, best moment for Malaysian football. Anybody out there know if the national team did any better? Thanks
ReplyDelete