Vorwan: It's time I am serous

Tampines Rovers coach Vorawan Chitavanich has admitted to S-league.com he has become more serious, this season, in training.

Frequently he could be heard barking at his players the moment they did something not to his satisfaction.

Nippy forward Aliff Shafaein got an earful for being too static in attack during a training game. Later on, new boy Zahid Ahmad messed up a defensive clearance and was immediately served notice that his coach did not like it.

Even physiotherapist Jeffrey Tham was not spared, when he laid out some training equipment differently from how Vorawan wanted them to be placed for an exercise.

The mood at Tampines Stadium was not always this combustible. Only last season, the Stags had seemed a jolly bunch whenever they turned up for training, some even showing a casual swagger in their step.

Not this time. If the explanation Vorawan offered for his searing behaviour was anything to go by, it would appear he is bent on whipping his charges into championship shape after three trophyless years.

“Many times in training, I see the players forget their discipline in defence,” he was quoted.

“I talked about this last year, and I think I talked about this two years ago. We must have discipline in defending, not only when we defend, but also when we attack.

“When we attack, we must be prepared to defend any time because things can change very fast. But I see in training that sometimes when the players attack and the opponent gets the ball, they don’t know who to mark.

“We talk about it every day, every day, but I see we are still not so good. That makes me unhappy.

“I also don’t like how some of the younger players come to training wanting to play for fun, wanting to just joke around,” added the Thai.

“I want to bring these players up to become S.League players, but they have to give 100% in training before they can improve. If they come here and jog when I want them to sprint, what do I bring them up here for?”

The seriousness in Vorawan’s tone was an indication of his desire to get things right this season and for me, he should done it earlier as Noh Alam Shah incident do show a lacked of discipline in the Stags camp for a while now.

It seem they do not believed training help (Seeing most of the dislike for Beep Test come from Stags camp) as long as they have talent but as things have shown, talent is just one of the requirement for Ahmad Latiff is the more talented of his generation but Indra will be given that title by later Generations as he worked harder than Latiff.