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Safuwan Baharudin


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hows he doing?

 

 

He's played in 2 games so far in his comeback to LionsXII. They are now in the FA Cup finals of the Malaysia Super Leage (MSL). The LionsXII are basically a Singaporean side playing in their neighbours Malaysia's league, much like Wellington Phoenix.

They're deploying him in a central midfield role now, which I feel makes him look like an average player. Sure he can win challenges, but not much apart from that. He excels best at centre defence imo. 

He should be playing in the final this coming Saturday. 

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As it happened, Safuwan and his club has won the Malaysia FA Cup, following a 3-1 victory over Kelantan FA. 

 

Safuwan once again played Central Midfield, and towards the end, operated almost like a third centre back. You can catch the game hightlights here: https://youtu.be/cvsw4tRhps8?t=11m56s but Saf doesnt appear much of course. You could catch the full game here https://youtu.be/5KI1FHIakz8 if you'd like. 

 

Abbas Saad is one of the commentators, a former Australian international, I believe.

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  • 2 weeks later...

On his instagram said goodbye to his wife who is flying to Melbourne....said he'd meet her up on the 17th. Anyone else drawing conclusions?

Maybe he's going to play football in Cambodia and Japan and she's doing her job as an Air Stewardess?

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He's not a fullback. He's a centre back who can play as a full back.

I'm actually surprised another club hasn't snapped him up. I think what's caused us to hesitate would be his injury and that if we signed him he would be a visa player as our backup centre back. Experience has shown that the top A League sides sign Visa players who are the finished product and are in their first XI. A guy like saf would need to be the 5th visa player I think and is basically competing with the cripple for that spot.

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He's not a fullback. He's a centre back who can play as a full back.

I'm actually surprised another club hasn't snapped him up. I think what's caused us to hesitate would be his injury and that if we signed him he would be a visa player as our backup centre back. Experience has shown that the top A League sides sign Visa players who are the finished product and are in their first XI. A guy like saf would need to be the 5th visa player I think and is basically competing with the cripple for that spot.

Injury concerns haven't stopped us signing players before, and we're still doing it. Unfortunately, Saf falls into the category of "nice to have" rather than "must have." He is a good player, no doubt about that in my mind, he proved it during a trial and in the league, but the visa player rule really makes it hard to fit him in.

 

What's cruel is that we we have under-performing duds in the squad and yet Saf misses out.

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Still think he's worth a place in our squad even as a visa player.

The first criteria of any Visa player must be that he is a definite starter. We cannot afford to sign/retain players on potential. Koren looks like retained , Saf offered way more in his short time with the club
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Still think he's worth a place in our squad even as a visa player.

The first criteria of any Visa player must be that he is a definite starter. We cannot afford to sign/retain players on potential.

Don't agree with this. If Visa players were so critical there is no way CFG would have only had 4 Visa players for much of our season. That's with Germano who was largely injured and Wielaert who was rarely seen.

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Still think he's worth a place in our squad even as a visa player.

The first criteria of any Visa player must be that he is a definite starter. We cannot afford to sign/retain players on potential.

I agree, but only to a point.

 

We have a number of players who are signed on their "potential" but who rarely if ever deliver.

 

Safuwan is a utility player who actually delivers.

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Still think he's worth a place in our squad even as a visa player.

The first criteria of any Visa player must be that he is a definite starter. We cannot afford to sign/retain players on potential.

I agree, but only to a point.

 

We have a number of players who are signed on their "potential" but who rarely if ever deliver.

 

Safuwan is a utility player who actually delivers.

So where does he start. CB ? Does he replace Chapman or Kisnorbo. RB we now have Franjic. LB ??? Unless we sign Georgevski maybe or DM replacing Paartalu. My point is that if we want the best possible side we must have all our VISA players commanding starting positions abd the only time it's not the case is due to injury or form. In the case of form then that will be when the backup player takes his chance and out performs his replacement and the Visa player has to push himself to get back into the team. I think we need to spend the major portion of the cap on 11 starters and the rest on minimum budget youngsters and not on servicable journeyman squadfillers.

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Eric has another 3 years to run on his deal.  I'm having nightmares about how slow he will be by the time he is in his 3 rd year with us, let alone his final year.

 

I think if given the chance Safuwan could replace Paartalu, who has looked slow and barely capable of playing 70 minutes.

Edited by Kiro Kompiro
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Still think he's worth a place in our squad even as a visa player.

The first criteria of any Visa player must be that he is a definite starter. We cannot afford to sign/retain players on potential. I agree, but only to a point.

 

We have a number of players who are signed on their "potential" but who rarely if ever deliver.

 

Safuwan is a utility player who actually delivers.

So where does he start. CB ? Does he replace Chapman or Kisnorbo. RB we now have Franjic. LB ??? Unless we sign Georgevski maybe or DM replacing Paartalu. My point is that if we want the best possible side we must have all our VISA players commanding starting positions abd the only time it's not the case is due to injury or form. In the case of form then that will be when the backup player takes his chance and out performs his replacement and the Visa player has to push himself to get back into the team. I think we need to spend the major portion of the cap on 11 starters and the rest on minimum budget youngsters and not on servicable journeyman squadfillers.

You make some good points, but you're looking at the squad only as it exists now. Many of our players are on contracts that expire at the end of next season - on 31st May 2016. I wouldn't rate Franjic as a certain starter in all 27 matches - he played only a handful of matches last season and has injury concerns. Chapman had some good matches and some shockers, and still has glandular fever hanging over him. Kisnorbo is now 34. I'd rate Saf as good as Mauk.

 

Safuwan is a versatile player. Sometimes IMO we have to look at the future, and I reckon he is worth a two-year contract.

 

We'll probably have to agree to disagree on this one!

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You also have to look at how often your ideal team will play. Realistically with injuries, suspensions and hopefully international duties, it is at best 70% so you need someone to be able to cover that. A good utility is very important in a capped league.

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I think we can sign saf whenever we want if need be or as an injury replacement again. Would be stupid to tie up a visa space so early when so many international players have just become available. sign up some other starting XI visa players, see what they cost us and if we are tight up for cap space he'd be a decent defensive utility pick up but we need to concentrate on signing the guys that will win us titles first.

IMO the areas we should look at for visas are another starting CB, LB and LW, if we can get rid of Koren use his spot for an AM or striker.

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My preferred way of using our visa spots would be:

Visa 1: Novillo

Visa 2: Germano

Visa 3: Left back (Or centre back if we sign Georgevski)

Visa 4: Right winger

Visa 5: Striker (International marquee

And as PerthHeart mentioned, Saf can be a handy injury replacement player

Not really fair to use the dude as injury replacement more than once. He worked hard last time and seemed pretty passionate about the club. Either reward him with a visa spot or thats the end of it.

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My preferred way of using our visa spots would be:

Visa 1: Novillo

Visa 2: Germano

Visa 3: Left back (Or centre back if we sign Georgevski)

Visa 4: Right winger

Visa 5: Striker (International marquee

And as PerthHeart mentioned, Saf can be a handy injury replacement player

Jeez, Saf is way better than Germano.

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My preferred way of using our visa spots would be:

Visa 1: Novillo

Visa 2: Germano

Visa 3: Left back (Or centre back if we sign Georgevski)

Visa 4: Right winger

Visa 5: Striker (International marquee

And as PerthHeart mentioned, Saf can be a handy injury replacement player

Jeez, Saf is way better than Germano.

 

Disagree. Don't get me wrong Saf impressed me and I would sign him in a heartbeat if he didn't require a visa player, but Germano is a lot better. The last 6? or so games he played he was always our second best player on the pitch behind Mooy

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My preferred way of using our visa spots would be:

Visa 1: Novillo

Visa 2: Germano

Visa 3: Left back (Or centre back if we sign Georgevski)

Visa 4: Right winger

Visa 5: Striker (International marquee

And as PerthHeart mentioned, Saf can be a handy injury replacement player

Not really fair to use the dude as injury replacement more than once. He worked hard last time and seemed pretty passionate about the club. Either reward him with a visa spot or thats the end of it.

 

But it would be his choice? If City wanted him and offered Saf the contract then Saf obviously has the choice to say no if he feels it's unfair.

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I think we can sign saf whenever we want if need be or as an injury replacement again. Would be stupid to tie up a visa space so early when so many international players have just become available. sign up some other starting XI visa players, see what they cost us and if we are tight up for cap space he'd be a decent defensive utility pick up but we need to concentrate on signing the guys that will win us titles first.

IMO the areas we should look at for visas are another starting CB, LB and LW, if we can get rid of Koren use his spot for an AM or striker.

 

yes there are plenty of visa players available world wide. Last season a certain Robbie Koren became available and look how that turned out. With Safuwan we have a player who has played in teh A-League and delivered; with everyone else its a wild guess how successful they will be.

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