Indonesia's football improvement strategy is very methodical!

Bahrain coach Talajic had the right to "speak sarcastically" in a press conference before the match against Indonesia, which they later lost 0-1, saying that "Indonesia has nearly 300 million people, but the national team needs a lot of Dutch players."

That statement is aimed at dividing the Indonesian football community, and even the Indonesian people are divided into two factions: those who support and those who oppose the phenomenon of mass naturalization of Dutch-born players playing abroad. Because this small group of high-quality players has almost completely occupied the official positions in the Indonesian national team.

PSSI focuses on youth football

Southeast Asian football only really started to pay attention to Indonesian youth football after the incident: Indonesia was stripped of the right to host the 2023 U20 World Cup finals for political reasons.

However, when Indonesia had a dynamic, football-loving, rich and powerful president like Mr. Thohir, PSSI lobbied and convinced FIFA to award the right to host the 2023 U17 World Cup.

Indonesia's football improvement strategy is very methodical!

Immediately after the successful organization and high appreciation from world football organizations, under the direction of President Thohir, PSSI took a step further when announcing that Indonesia would cooperate with Singapore to apply to host the 2025 FIFA U-20 World Cup and the 2025 or 2029 FIFA U-17 World Cup. Immediately after that, the Singapore Football Federation also officially announced that it would apply to host these two youth tournaments with Indonesia.

Explaining the reason for hosting the youth tournament and withdrawing the intention to host the 2034 World Cup, Mr. Thohir said that Indonesian football needs to rebuild youth football and this strategy started in 2018, when Indonesia applied to be the host country and then in October 2019 was awarded the right to host the 2021 U20 World Cup.

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The tournament was scheduled to be held from May 20 to June 12, 2021, but was later postponed to May 2023 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Indonesia had prepared facilities, upgraded and repaired 6 stadiums for this event. Therefore, when the right to host the U20 World Cup in 2023 was stripped, and the host country Peru did not meet FIFA's standards, PSSI President Thohir convinced FIFA to move the U17 World Cup 2023 from Peru to Indonesia.

At this tournament, although the U17 Indonesian team did not make it past the group stage, the young Indonesian players left their mark with two draws against strong teams Ecuador and Panama.

Don't forget that PSSI is not only focusing on rebuilding youth football with a new project since 2018 and they have invited coach Shin Tae-yong as the chief engineer since 2020, while meeting all the requirements of Mr. Shin Tae-yong, former coach of the Korean national team, with only one requirement: to comprehensively improve Indonesian football from youth teams to the national team.

That is because the national team is focusing on the goal of winning a ticket to the 2026 World Cup finals, so at the 2024 ASEAN Cup, PSSI only sent the U22 team to participate with the purpose of preparing for the 2025 SEA Games, where they will come to the tournament to defend the gold medal.

Coach Shin Tae-yong

Thus, PSSI has a very clear and detailed strategy, goals and implementation plan, as well as setting specific targets for teams from youth to national.

Therefore, when the Indonesian team was eliminated from the group stage of the 2024 ASEAN Cup while the goal was to at least reach the semi-finals, it was the last straw that forced PSSI to fire coach Shin Tae-yong.

Now, for the first time in the history of Indonesian football, the U17, U20, U23 and national teams have all qualified for the Asian finals, while the national team is still on the way to conquering a ticket to the 2026 World Cup finals.

Firmly "Dutchify"

Erick Thohir, the father of "Dutchification", explained the project, which has been approved and fully supported by the Indonesian government, that he wants to gather the strength of the Indonesian diaspora around the world. Mr. Thohir also emphasized that naturalized players must have Indonesian blood so that they can also understand and love Indonesian culture, so there is no reason why Indonesian people do not welcome children from abroad.

Indonesian national team coach - Patrick Kluivert

To be naturalized, in addition to the professional factor, there is also a mandatory detail that the players must be playing abroad, which means that domestic players are not competing with naturalized players in the domestic league, on the contrary, domestic players must try harder if they want to wear the national team jersey. PSSI has created fair and good competition for Indonesian football.

"We don't care where anyone comes from. Indonesia needs an increasingly strong squad to suit the tactics and requirements of top-flight football," said President Thohir.

The pinnacle is to naturalize, to take advantage of the strength of the Indonesian community around the world. Because only relying on youth training, PSSI realized that it was not enough to raise the position of Indonesian football, because the young generation invested in since 2018 when wearing the Indonesian national team jersey still lost to the Vietnamese national team at the AFF Cup under coach Park Hang-seo.

Therefore, naturalization is the fastest way to achieve the best results in the shortest time. At the peak, with Mr. Thohir, it was not only the diplomacy of bringing the world championship to his home country Indonesia to organize, it was not only a "Dutchification" project, Mr. Thohir also organized a friendly match during FIFA Day between the reigning world champions Argentina and the Indonesian team. Explaining this uneven match, Mr. Erick said the purpose was to want the Indonesian team to have the opportunity to compete with the world's top teams.

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Mr. Erick's plan is to organize a match like this every year to test courage, increase confidence, and get rid of inferiority complexes, not to gain points on the FIFA rankings.

Recently, Mr. Thohir happily announced that PSSI has reached a cooperation agreement with the Dutch Football Federation (KNVB), in which KNVB will help Indonesian football develop from youth football, women's football to the national team for both men and women.

In addition, if nothing changes, in 2025 there will be a friendly match between the Indonesian and Dutch national teams.

Now that they are no longer able to compete directly for a ticket to the 2026 World Cup in the third qualifying round, the Indonesian team still has a chance to compete for a ticket to the fourth qualifying round in Asia to compete for a ticket to the 2026 World Cup (*).

Indonesia still has a chance to compete for a ticket to the fourth qualifying round of the Asian region to compete for a place at the 2026 World Cup finals.

Will Indonesia's dream of participating in the 2026 World Cup come true?

The answer is still ahead. But PSSI once said that no football has developed sustainably with the wave of naturalization. However, PSSI's point of view is very clear: naturalizing players for the purpose of the 2026 World Cup, absolutely not eliminating domestic players. Indonesian football needs a World Cup ticket to create a foundation for development with long-term strategies in which the future of Indonesian football is still the development of the system, starting with youth training.

(*) The three third-placed and three fourth-placed teams from the three groups in the third qualifying round will advance to the fourth qualifying round. The six teams will be divided into two groups, playing a round-robin at a central venue. The top team from each group will qualify for the 2026 World Cup. The two runners-up will advance to the fifth qualifying round, where they will play two legs. The winners will advance to the intercontinental play-off round, with one representative from Africa, South America and Oceania, and two representatives from North and Central America.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/chien-luoc-nang-tam-bong-da-cua-indonesia-rat-bai-ban-196250327125424104.htm