At the Olympic Stadium, U.22 Indonesia and U.22 Thailand brought fans a match full of flavors from goals, controversies and even penalty cards. After 120 minutes, the young players of the "Land of Thousand Islands" defeated U.22 Thailand 5-2 to win the championship after 32 years of waiting.
The heated argument in the final minutes made the match extremely tense.
Members of both teams could not keep calm and rushed into the house.
Many players fell down when the clash between the two sides occurred.
Indonesian coaching staff members also joined in the controversy.
After the victory of coach Indra Sjafri’s team, many newspapers in Indonesia wrote articles praising the bravery of the players. As soon as the match ended, Indosport published an article titled “After 32 years of waiting, Garuda won the gold medal!”. In addition to summarizing the match, this page also praised coach Indra Sjafri.
This newspaper wrote: “We won the championship because of the talent of coach Indra Sjafri, in fact, our coach seems to have magic. Coach Indra Sjafri and the young Indonesian players won the AFF U.22 Cup in 2019 and now the SEA Games gold medal. Indonesia has lost 15 out of 22 times meeting Thailand at the SEA Games, but this time we made them look at us with different eyes.”
The coaching staff and players of U.22 Thailand ran to celebrate in front of coach Indra Sjafri.
A player of U.22 Indonesia caused the assistant coach of U.22 Thailand to fall.
The clash between the two sides begins here.
U.22 Thailand players were stopped by referee and coaching staff
The Malaysian newspaper The Star also paid much attention to this match and called the victory of U.22 Indonesia over U.22 Thailand a shock. The Star wrote: “After 32 years of waiting, Indonesia finally won the gold medal in men's football at the SEA Games. Since the football tournament was restricted to age, Indonesia has not won a gold medal. They won silver in 2011 and 2013.
Garuda’s young players, coached by coach Indra Sjafri, shocked Thailand 5-2 in the final. Thailand played very poorly in this match. Not only that, they also finished the match with only 8 men on the field.”
The Star page criticized the U.22 Thailand players for playing very poorly in this match.
Not only that, this newspaper also said that the continuous appearance of penalty cards almost "ruined" the match.
In total, the referee showed out seven red cards and more than 10 yellow cards in the men's football final.
Meanwhile, Singapore’s Straits Times newspaper published an article with the title “In a match of extreme tension, Indonesia won the gold medal”. In addition to praising the performance of the Indonesian players, the newspaper also called them “heroes” of the country, helping the athletes ease the pain of being stripped of the right to host the U.22 World Cup by FIFA.
The Straits Times wrote: “Indonesia won the gold medal when they fought against all odds to defeat Thailand 5-2 in a dramatic SEA Games final.
The success on the pitch comes at a dark time for Indonesian football. In October 2022, 135 people were killed at a stadium in East Java when police fired tear gas, causing a stampede among spectators. In March, world governing body FIFA transferred the hosting rights for the Under-20 World Cup from Indonesia to Argentina, depriving young Indonesian players of international football. The victory was well deserved.”
The Straits Times said that victory in this match is very meaningful for U.22 Indonesia.
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