SEA Games Football: Mikasa football flies like cheap plastic ball

Pravin Gunasegaran (#12) of Singapore controls the ball against Thura Shine (#20) of Myanmar. Pravin had a chance from just outside the penalty box at the start of the second half that just whizzed past the left upright. (Photo © Lee Jian Wei/Red Sports)

Jalan Besar Stadium, Thursday, June 4, 2015 — Singapore lost 1–2 to Myanmar in their second game of the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games under-23 football tournament.

Here are three talking points from last night’s game.

Singapore’s Missed Chances (Again)
The 1–2 loss could have been a 4–2 win for Singapore. Sahil Suhaimi (#7) had at least three chances, but good defending or poor shooting saw him draw another blank for the second game in a row.

Pravin Gunasagaran (#12) went close with a stiff shot at the start of the second half, and Irfan Fandi (#17) had a goal disallowed because in football these days, you cannot so much as touch the goalkeeper anymore when he is in the air.

Scoring is an issue – no recognised Singapore striker has scored from open play in 180 minutes of football.

Myanmar Crowd Support
The YouTube ‘live’ telecast for some reason came without any commentary and only had the ambient crowd noise from Jalan Besar Stadium. For the whole game, all you could hear was, “Myanmar! Myanmar!” It sounded like an away game for Singapore. 2,000 Myanmar fans managed to out-sing and out-cheer 5,500 Singapore fans. (It was supposed to be a sold-out game but there were still visible chunks of empty seats in the Singapore sections.)

Mikasa Match Ball
When kicked, the Mikasa match ball has the same flight consistency as a cheap plastic ball you buy at a HDB provision shop.

Singapore goalkeeper Syazwan Buhari (#24) will take the flak for his goalkeeping error, but watch how the ball takes weird dips and swerves on its way into goal. The last time some of us saw a ball swerve like that, it was while playing with plastic balls on basketball courts.

*See first video below for highlights of all the goals

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2015 SEA Games Football – Fixtures and Results