Alfred Riedl And His Evidence: The Beginning Of Foreign Players Interested In Defending The Indonesian National Team

Portrait of Alfred Riedl while coaching the Indonesian national team. (ANTARA)

JAKARTA - Polesan Alfred Riedl brought a new color to the Indonesian football national team in the 2010s. The Austrian coach was initially questioned. Riedl is considered not to bring the Indonesian national team to shine on the Southeast Asian stage. However, Riedl took a breakthrough.

He was able to bring Indonesia ahead. He is known to have dared to write off them undisciplined. In fact, in his era he became the pioneer of coaches who used assing' players in the national team: Irfan Bachdim and Cristian Gonzales. Both are considered to have made the national team move up to a high level.

Efforts to build the Indonesian football national team are not easy. Whoever becomes the coach, will certainly be connected to a series of unfinished chronic problems related to Indonesian football. They face the problem of the absence of a football career and the level of stuck competition.

This condition makes it difficult for the Indonesian national team to explore the dream of becoming a Southeast Asian champion. Indonesia has always been tackled by Thailand. The hope came back when the All-Indonesian Football Association (PSSI) signed Alfred Riedl to replace Benny Dollo in 2009.

At first PSSI did not have too high hopes. Because, Riedl is not the main target. PSSI had already wanted to sign a coach from the Netherlands, Ruud Krol and a coach from Turkey, Fatih Terim. However, that desire was dashed because discussing the issue of salary did not find a common ground.

This condition made PSSI strengthen its only hope on Riedl's shoulders. Riedl's style of coaching is considered superior to the two previous candidates. Riedl often prioritizes discipline and firmness. This firmness makes all kinds of decisions related to the national team unable to intervene.

Boaz Solossa has just been crossed out. Riedl was always the determinant from the start to the final decision regarding the national team. He made a training schedule. He and his team decided who would be brought into the national team. No players are entrusted.

Anyone who deserves to play will be chosen, especially those who are shining and well known for their discipline. Riedl also sent the Deputy for Engineering of the National Team, Iman Arif, to monitor players. Even then, the passing or passing of being a player depends on the performance shown to Riedl.

Trio Riedl, Wolfgang Pikal (Assistant coach), and Iman is the one who plays a role in forming and polishing the appearance of the national team. The formation is carried out with the monitoring system (scouting) of players formed by Iman. So far, the National Team Agency does not have a monitoring system, making it difficult to find talented players.

"Every month we traveled 20 times to various regions. From this monitoring, a foreign name appeared in the national team, but impressed on the green field, including Muhammad Nasuha and Zulkifli Syukur," said Harun Mahbub and his friends in their report in Tempo magazine entitled Garuda Pelipur Lara (2011).

Riedl's system of player identification is everywhere. In fact, it penetrates players of Indonesian descent abroad. Irfan Bachdim is the main target. The football player who has an Indonesian-Dutch citizenship degree has experienced Ajax Amsterdam's football academy.

Bachdim then had the opportunity to move to SV Argon and made him a phenomenal player for being the top scorer at the club's junior level. That passion made him move to FC Utrecht in 2003.

He became a junior Uthrecht while occasionally being a senior team reserve, until finally anchored to HFC Haarlem. Riedl observed the career and asked Irfan to defend Indonesia. Irfan only needed to decide to recognize Indonesian citizenship and leave Dutch citizenship. Bachdim finally chose Indonesia.

The second player that Riedl wants to get is a player from Argentina, Cristian Gonzales who has been poor in the Indonesian League since 2003. The process that Gonzales must go through is not as smooth as Bachdim. Even though Gonzales is known as a powerful goal machine in the Indonesian League.

Gonzales has long harbored the intention to devote himself to defending Indonesia. In that process, Gonzales had to be willing not to travel abroad for five years in order to defend Indonesia. In fact, some of his relatives who were in his hometown died, Gonzales chose not to return home.

The struggle was finally captured. Gonzales was successfully naturalized to become an Indonesian citizen. This means that he and Irfan Bachdim have the right to defend the banner of the Red and White national team in the 2010 Suzuki AFF trophy arena. Both of them are able to become shining stars. Moreover, their positions are both attackers.

Gonzales was able to produce goals. Likewise, Irfan Bachdim. The smell of victory after victory also greeted. Even though Indonesia finally had to admit Malaysia's superiority in the 2010 Suzuki AFF Cup final.

Recently, the impact of the presence of assing' players is considered capable of bringing Indonesia up to the level. Foreign player recruitment is then considered effective in cutting the agenda of early coaching of Indonesian players and inflated competitions.

However, Riedl did not fully agree with only relying on foreign players. He always holds back by not discriminating between 'assing' players or others. Everyone got the opportunity. His existence in the national team is still supported by playing skills. Not where that person was born. Even though later people considered the three of them --Riedl, Bachdim, and Gonzales -- as pioneers in using foreign blood to support the Indonesian national team.

"In the 2010 and 2014 AFF Cups I called them a lot. I am a coach who doesn't care about someone's background. They have an Indonesian passport and have the right to defend their country. If they show the best quality on the competition stage they are in, the door to strengthen the national team is wide open," said Riedl as quoted on the page.com, 1 August 2016.