Political Spectrum in Indonesia’s Football
Leftwing and Right-wing in the Football World
As we all know in politics there have been two sides that have different views on politics, such as the right-wing side is the conservative side which believes in traditional values, while on the other side, there is the left-wing which often promotes progressive values. Hence if we take a look at the football world, the political spectrum is similar, in spite of that both sides argue about naturalized players. Whereby the right side of the spectrum known as the conservative fans or officials believes that the naturalization process of players is wrong and national team should prioritize local-born players first. However, the other side which is the progressive side from the left believes that the naturalization of player’s citizenship is not a bad thing and should be supported. The debate between the two groups often happens in most countries especially in Southeast Asia such as in Indonesia.
As I have researched and followed Indonesian football for the past 13 years, I find the football political spectrum in Indonesia is somehow complicated. Whereby the right is not just filled with conservatives, however, there are the center-right group that believes naturalization is not wrong as long as the federation naturalizes players of Indonesian Descent. The same thing also happens in the left, whereby aside from the progressive groups of fans and officials there are the center-left which are groups that believe naturalization without Indonesian descent is not a problem, however it must be limited. Meanwhile, the naturalization of players of Indonesia descent must have unlimited quotas. The debate between the left and the right has been happening a lot lately, especially knowing that the federation officials, football analyst and ex coaches has its own views towards the development of football in Indonesia.
There are a lot of examples of conservative people in the Indonesian football industry, an example is Fakhri Husaini an ex under-16 and under-19 Indonesia national football team coach. He is known to be one of the most conservative men in Indonesian football, where he often criticize and reject naturalization players. In which he even often shouted Local Pride, in social media’s while in the same time stating that progressive fans are just people that enjoy getting colonized. Fakhri Husaini has also been criticizing the Indonesian national football team coach Shin Tae Yong ever since he starts training Indonesia, he has been criticizing Shin Tae Yong by saying that he is not an Indonesian and local coaches are way better then him. However Fakhri Husaini is not the only Indonesian right-wing in terms of football, since there are even retired football players who is also a conservative and a pro local such as Markus Horison an ex-goalkeeper of the Indonesian national football team and now a goalkeeper coach of the under-16 national team, when the U-16 team won the AFF final on 12 August 2022 there was video footage of Markus and another coach official name Gilang shouted local pride this shows that Markus is trying show the superiority of local players. Hence this led to critics stating that Markus is a clout seeker, since back in 2010 when he was a goalkeeper and Indonesia was a runner there are lots of fans stating that the reason why Indonesia is in the runner is because of Cristian Gonzales the naturalized striker of Indonesia and Irfan Bachdim a mixed blood that plays for the national team back in 2010. The arguments of the local pride concept is discoursed and attacked by a lot of progressive fans and also official.
There are a lot of left-wing fans, analysts and officials such as the current head of the Indonesian Football Federation (PSSI) Erick Thohir who is a center-left, ex-official of PSSI Hasani Abdul Ghani and football analyst such as Sing Binder and also Justinus Lhaksana. Erick Thohir has stated that he is never against any naturalized and always welcomes them because they are also and Indonesian, however we should also never forget our young local players. When Hasani Abdul Ghani was in the executive committee of PSSI, he stated that naturalized players of mixed blood and full foreign blood has given great contribution to Indonesia football team whereby an example is when Jordi Amat who often contact his previous club in Europe to promote some of his teammates to his old team, while there are young players such as Elkan Baggot, Ivar Jenner and Rafael Struick who has a better skills in its passing and football mindset, which can contribute by sharing their football knowledge to local players. This has also been stated by football analyst like Sing Binder and Justinus Lhaksana where they stated that naturalized players can help share their knowledge to local players. Therefore this has led me agreeing with the left if we are talking about naturalized player in football.
As a centre-left in the football political spectrum, I support the naturalization program that is currently done by PSSI. We really need the naturalization players especially the foreign players with Indonesian decent to help develop our team, it is true that we have a huge population in our country where our population reaches more then 250 milion people. However our football academies is not as good as football academies abroad and also those naturalized player can help share their knowledge they receive in the academy abroad to our local player. As we can also see the proof in the AFC Asian Cup qualification two FIFA Matchday and also the 2022 AFF Mitsubishi Electric cup, we have played Elkan Baggot, Jordi Amat, Marc Klok, Fano Lilipaly and Spasojevic whereby those players has shown that they have very great skillseven greater than the local player who is even playing abroad. Hence we should always welcome and accept them knowing that they chose to support and love Indonesia and also they are from a great league in Europe just like the upcoming mixed blood players such as Sandy Walsh from Kv Mechelen a team from the first division of the Belgian league and Shayne Pattynama who is from Viking FK a team from the first division of the Norwegian league. Hence I do believe that these naturalized players can contribute a lot to upcoming competitions such as the AFC Asian Cup in Qatar and also the world cup qualification. However young local players must never be forgotten, since they are also the future of Indonesia in which they must be guided to play abroad so they may bring new knowledge that can help contribute to the development of the Indonesian football industry, while also the local league must be developed. which they may help improve and increase the skill of local and young players of Indonesia.
In terms of naturalizing non-Indonesian descent players, I am not against this naturalization, however, we must have a limit on naturalizing non-blood players, the limits are going to be based on the situation of the Indonesian football industry. An example of a great naturalization of non-Indonesian blood players is the naturalization of Cristian Gonzales in 2010 and also the naturalization of Marc Klok. These naturalizations are considered to be great because as we can see in 2010 there have also been a crisis of great strikers in Indonesia, hence the federation and Alfred Riedl chose Cristian Gonzales to be the main striker in the national team, which it then became a success because Gonzales has contributed by scoring in the semi-final of the 2010 AFF Suzuki Cup that had then led Indonesia to the final. The same thing with Marc Klok, where Indonesia has lack of players that can play as both attacking and defending midfielders, hence the federation and Shin Tae Yong then chose to naturalize Marc Klok. This has then become a success because Marc Klok was able to be the playmaker and contribute to a lot of winnings in the FIFA Matchday, AFF Cup and also the qualifying of Indonesia for AFC Asian Cup.
