Sports Minutes: Safuwan Baharudin on ‘do-or-die’ Malaysia clash, Indonesia red card & Lions’ caps dream

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Sports Minutes with Zia-ul Raushan on Money FM 89.3.

Zia-ul Raushan (0:05)

Money FM 89.3. It's time for Sports Minutes with me, Zia-ul Raushan. The FIFA ASEAN Cup 2026 in full flow, with all eyes now on match day three, where Singapore need a result against our Causeway rivals, Malaysia, to stand a chance of qualifying out of the group. So how are the boys doing after one loss and one win in their opening two matches? What's the mood like in the camp? And how is the prep coming along for the battle in Bandung? Well, the man with the answers is a man who is made for the big occasions. His name is Safuwan Baharudin, and he joins me from the lines. Then Safuwan, welcome to the show. How are you doing?

Safuwan Baharudin (0:41)

I'm good, I'm good.

Zia-ul Raushan (0:42)

You feeling okay in terms of this is a Zoom conversation? You feeling comfortable?

Safuwan Baharudin (0:46)

Yeah, I'm comfortable.

Zia-ul Raushan (0:48)

Saf, let's talk about the FIFA ASEAN Cup, the first edition of the tournament. How's the logistics? How's everything going so far?

Safuwan Baharudin (0:54)

This is probably away from what I expected. The logistics wise, the state, the food, the complexity of the whole tournament is just like a FIFA standard tournament. So I think it's something that we will might not feel if we were to live this tournament, having said that, yes, we come together with the football also.

Zia-ul Raushan (1:18)

Let's talk about the football then, and I have to talk about matchday one, that 2-0 defeat to Indonesia, right? What is it about you and Red Cuts against Indonesia, bro?

Safuwan Baharudin (1:30)

I don't know. Personally, I think it was frustrating because everybody could see that he was a Safuwan, but I think football is meant to be like that, particularly when Bahar is involved.

It's not like before, you can run away with certain things. So, when we move forward, I think we are all built to move eventually in life, and also in football. And how we come back stronger is to bounce back against Bangladesh, which we did. And now it's all down to the last game.

Zia-ul Raushan (2:14)

Safuwan, I want to ask you this. You're a senior player in the team, right? When incidences like that happen, you get a red card, your team has to play with 10 men. Do you speak to the team after? What do you say to them?

Safuwan Baharudin (2:25)

Personally, even after games, we're talking about the red card, but I think any other normal game, I don't even speak to the players. So, what more with incidents like that?

I don't usually speak to the boys about what happened, but you should probably know who I will speak to with that kind of incidents. So, I always speak to the man who is higher than me, which is Harris, to get some pointers.

Zia-ul Raushan (3:06)

The man that is higher than us is definitely Harris, right? I want to talk to you about that one-nil win against Bangladesh. For you, the point of view would have been slightly different because you watched the game. What did you make of that victory? Because it seemed quite difficult, but we got the job done.

Safuwan Baharudin (3:21)

Yeah, I think looking or probably watching from the stand is two different views. You shouldn't say that you are looking from a friend view, but looking from a brother and also a teammate point of view, just that you are not closer to the boys on the field. So, in a certain situation, you feel that you would just love to be on the field, fighting against one or a few of them.

But I think the most important thing is to get the job done. I think it's quite a difficult tournament because this is probably the first tournament that we play every two games. Every two days, we are playing a game and that is one hectic of a schedule. You know, you are not recovered. I won't say you are not recovered, but you are not fully recovered for this game and we just got here in Mandong after yesterday and that's like probably 30 hours after after Bangladesh game and it's another 24 hours before we play games in Malaysia. So you can see where it goes. I won't, we won't use this as an excuse, but I think from the outside world, people need to know how actively scheduled is. And people will see us as we are living this, this kind of traveling. People will see us as adult life who is working and traveling, enjoying certain, certain moments. But, you know, moments like this, you know, the hardship that we go through will only determine how strong we are as a team.