Perak must be patient

KUALA LUMPUR: Perak must remain patient with regards to the status of their participation for the qualifying round of the Asian Champions League (ACL) for next season.

This follows the FA of Malaysia’s (FAM) announcement that they have yet to receive official confirmation with regards to Perak’s application to take part in Asia’s prestigious club competition.

However, based on the explanation of FAM secretary-general, Stuart Ramalingam to NSTP Sport yesterday (Wednesday), it seems that Perak will almost certainly take part in the ACL after Pahang did not put in any appeal to the country’s football governing body.

“For now we still cannot confirm Perak’s participation in the ACL and what I can say is that the speculation making its rounds on social media is fake news.

“FAM’s club licensing, First Instance Body (FIB), is expected to make an announcement with regards to the team’s application for a license the latest by October 17 (Wednesday).

“Perhaps the earliest that I can inform of any latest developments would be by Wednesday. For the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) license, we will need to send the Malaysia League’s (M-League) teams’ applications to them (AFC).

“After that the AFC will inform us as to the status of all the teams’ applications,” he told NSTP Sport.

Yesterday (Wednesday), NSTP Sport reported that the Perak FA (PAFA) are still waiting for confirmation from FAM following the emergence of the ACL’s qualifying schedule on social media which has Perak listed among the teams.

The slot for the ACL initially belonged to Pahang as they emerged as the FA Cup champions this season, however they are also facing a two year suspension from applying for an AFC license from FAM because they declined the offer to take part in this year’s AFC Cup.

In fact, it is understood that Pahang did not make an appeal to FAM so the slot could end up being Perak’s by virtue of being runners-up in the Super League.

“Up till now Pahang have not made an appeal and it seems as though they are not interested. So as reported before this, Perak are the ones who could take their place,” added Stuart.