The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion
The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion |
| West Brom benefit from Long game Posted: 19 Nov 2012 03:45 PM PST NOV 20 — While Fernando Torres might have entered Chelsea's trip to West Bromwich Albion on Saturday as the striker under the spotlight, by the end of the game everyone was talking about Shane Long. Torres cut a miserable figure, sadly reproducing the worst of his form since his £50 million (RM243 million) move to Stamford Bridge nearly two years ago. He failed to trouble home goalkeeper Boaz Myhill and was substituted after 62 minutes, even though Chelsea were trailing and in need of a goal. Long, by contrast, received a standing ovation from West Brom fans when he was replaced, having run himself into the ground, with 10 minutes remaining. The Irish striker scored his team's opening goal — which he marked by revealing a T-shirt bearing a message commemorating his recently-deceased grandmother — and then created the second for Peter Odemwingie in a memorable 2-1 victory for the Baggies.  Long (centre) celebrates his goal against Chelsea during their English Premier League match at The Hawthorns in West Bromwich on November 17, 2012. — Reuters pic Although he enjoyed watching the EPL on television — developing a particular fondness for Leeds United due to the Irish players in their squad — he hardly ever played football due to the demands placed on his time by his burgeoning hurling career, which saw him represent his county and appear in two national youth finals. But at the age of 17, his life took a big turn in a new direction. He had recently started playing football more regularly and was quickly noticed by scouts for Cork City, one of the biggest teams in Ireland, who wasted no time in handing him a professional contract. Within months Long caught the eye of English Championship club Reading, who were in town to assess the talents of another Cork striker, Kevin Doyle. When Reading subsequently signed Doyle, they decided to take a gamble on the young and raw Long as well, buying him for the meagre sum of €25,000 (RM100,000). I worked at Reading at the time, and vividly remember meeting 18-year-old Long for the first time when he arrived in England during that summer of 2005. He was a shy, nervous and polite teenage boy, clearly bewildered by the speed at which everything was happening around him. At the press conference to announce his signing, he was accompanied not by a smart-suited, sharp-talking, jewellery-laden agent... but by his mother. And when he was asked to conduct an interview for local television, he turned bright red at the prospect as his mother beamed away in the background, unable to disguise her gleeful pride at her son's glamorous new status. But it soon became apparent that little Shane was the real deal. Fast, athletic, incredibly fit, with a prodigious leap and an unshakeable work ethic, he was promptly fast-tracked into the senior squad as initial notions of him being "one for the future" were swept aside. Within five months he was in the first team. By the end of the season he'd made 15 appearances and scored four goals. And most amazingly of all, it happened during a season which saw Reading win promotion by romping to the Championship title with a record-breaking 106 points. All of a sudden, Shane Long was a professional footballer in the EPL. It was fairytale stuff, especially considering the fact that his main sport had always been hurling and that he'd only been playing football seriously for two years. Maintaining that rate of progress would have been impossible and for the next couple of years Long's form dipped somewhat, coinciding with Reading suffering relegation in 2008, but he was reinvigorated by the appointment of Brian McDermott as Reading manager in 2010. McDermott possesses Irish roots and had gone to great efforts to look after Long when he first arrived in England four years previously, and the closeness of their relationship led to a scoring spree that saw Long finish the 2010/11 season as the second-top scorer in the Championship with 21 goals. That form attracted plenty of interest, with Celtic, Newcastle and West Ham among the clubs linked with his signature before West Brom eventually won the race by splashing out a £6.5 million fee in the summer of 2011. Quite a return on Reading's initial €25,000 investment. Neither Long nor West Brom have looked back since, and the striker is now gradually establishing a reputation as one of the EPL's better all-round front men. He'll never be the most prolific striker in the world, but he offers so much to a team through his work rate, ability to stretch defences and penetration down the wings that his contribution has to be measured in far more than goals. Long's performances are one of the main reasons for the Baggies' magnificent start to the season, and their big concern now must be whether they can keep hold of him. There's every chance that the Shane Long story will have another new chapter before long. As for Torres, you have to suspect that his days at Stamford Bridge are numbered. It's increasingly impossible to escape the conclusion that the striker has been left permanently damaged by the injury problems he suffered around the 2010 World Cup finals, and that he will never be the same player again. With increasing rumours that Chelsea will sign Atletico Madrid's brilliant Colombian striker Radamel Falcao in January, perhaps allowing Torres to return to Spain — and his former club Atletico — as part of the deal would be exactly the change of scenery that he needs. * The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist. |
| From the makers of infotainment Posted: 19 Nov 2012 03:35 PM PST NOV 20 — Certain ministers and government functionaries have been known particularly in the last few years to have the knack for providing "infotainment", an uneasy concoction between information and entertainment, to information-hungry Malaysians. And most of the time this infotainment is the result of the mental diarrhoea that these bunch of people think is fit to share with fellow Malaysians. The latest offering came from the indefatigable Information, Communication and Culture Minister Rais Yatim (whose comment was transmitted via his special duties officer Mohd Nazri Abdullah) who urged the Broadcasting Department, among other government agencies, "to provide fair coverage for all Barisan Nasional (BN) state and parliamentary representatives in the state (of Sabah)." Of concern to Rais was that "representatives in many areas in Sabah, such as the islands and interior, did not get much coverage although they too were working hard for the people." The principle of fairness is noble and all-encompassing indeed, and which is why it should be applied not only to BN representatives in Sabah but also those from the opposition parties for they too represent a portion of the populace in the state. In other words, selective fairness is, if I may employ an oxymoronic terminology for this occasion, unfair fairness. A truly warped notion of even-handedness. What is paramount here is that the work of all elected representatives in Sabah must be covered by the Broadcasting Department if it is to ensure fair journalism as it should be practised by an institution funded by taxpayers' money. Furthermore, this concern for fair coverage in Sabah should not be given emphasis only prior to a general election but for all times. Politicians, irrespective of their party affiliations, must be made accountable all the time via the media, among other institutions. Incidentally, talking of pre-election media coverage reminds us of images of Sabah and Sarawak natives in yesteryears that "graced" the front pages of the mainstream newspapers before the nation went to the poll in a way that can only be construed as being cynical on the part of the KL (Kuala Lumpur)-centric editors concerned. This brings me to the next related point: the Broadcasting Department and RTM owe it to the people, especially the taxpayers, to give a fair and comprehensive coverage of not only politicians from both sides of the political divide, but also and especially the ordinary people who cry out for easy and equal access to the mainstream media. For one thing, the news bulletin on RTM (Radio Television Malaysia), if it were to aim for higher standards of journalism, must not be about (often grisly) stuff that come out from the gaping mouths of Cabinet ministers and ruling politicians only, but also commentaries and feedback from other stakeholders such as professionals, social activists, villagers, the poor and the marginalised. More importantly, democracy demands that people be given their voice in such important matters as public policies and economic measures taken by the authorities, which impinge upon their day-to-day existence. This is participatory democracy at its best — apart from the normal routine of the people exercising their democratic right to vote every four or five years at the end of a parliamentary term. Besides, opening up the media to the ordinary people beats meeting with a select group of youngsters at a fancy coffee shop in, say, upmarket Bangsar in the professed desire on the part of the political leadership to intently seek out their opinions. Attentive and genuine listening to a wider audience doesn't necessarily have to be an expensive and exclusive endeavour. But providing fair access to the media is more than just being concerned about fairness. It is also about ensuring diversity in media content so that it reflects the rich diversity that we have in our multiethnic, multicultural and multi-religious society. Is it any wonder, then, why, for instance, after so many years since the formation of Malaysia, many Malaysians in the peninsula are still less knowledgeable, if not ignorant, about their cousins in east Malaysia and vice versa? Moreover, diversity also shouldn't be limited to only offering news bulletins in vernacular languages on television and radio as well. Obviously, it involves much more than that. In concrete terms, it means that the broadcasting stations, apart from the print media, have to liberate themselves so that they offer programmes and content not only to cater to the political and cultural needs of the dominant groups of society, but also and especially those of the minorities as well. In this way, Malaysians from various walks of life, i.e. the diverse stakeholders, can be made to feel a sense of belonging to the constructed nation called Malaysia. Only then can we Malaysians be proud of the media content that is not only informative, but also entertaining and intellectually challenging at the same time. * The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist. |
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