No Singapore club has been crowned the local league champions since 2014, when Warriors FC beat all and sundry to claim the title.
From 2015 onwards, the title has been picked up by both foreign clubs which play in the league – Albirex Niigata and Brunei DPMM FC.
And this is something which irritates and irks the Singapore football fan, Singapore skipper Hariss Harun reckons.
In an interview with 1 Play Sports, the Lions skipper who has joined up with Lion City Sailors said, “Something which bugs us Singaporeans is that a foreign team has won the league for the past six years now.”
And he agrees that the primary target for his new club is to win the league title.
He left Malaysia’s Johor Darul Ta’zim and returned to Singapore mid-way through the season by mutual agreement, and he hooked up with the Sailors on a three and a half year deal, which could well take him towards the twilight of his playing career.
He added that the club had a “good pathway, good direction” and that he was “impressed with the project”, which reminded him of what it was like at JDT when he first joined them upon hearing the vision of the Crown Prince of Johor, who is the owner of the club.
JDT have dominated the Malaysia Super League, and have been champions consecutively since 2014 and were also crowned champions of the Asian Football Confederation Cup in 2015.
Hariss, now 31, added that the Lion City Sailors have to dominate in Singapore so the club can be up in the mix with the “big boys in Asia.”
Watch the full interview.
Photo: Lion City Sailors