Malaysia Premier League

Origin

Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) decided to privatise the Malaysian League in 2004 season onwards where Malaysia Super League was formed. Teams in Malaysia Premier League 1 and Malaysia Premier League 2 was then was put through a qualification and playoff to be promoted into Malaysia Super League. Teams that failed the qualification was put into now a second-tier league Malaysia Premier League (Liga Premier in Malay).

The Malaysia Premier League 1 was the nation's top-tier league from 1994 until 2003 when it was succeeded by the formations of professional football league, Malaysia Super League in 2004 by Football Association of Malaysia. The Malaysia Premier League 2 then was replaced by the new Malaysia Premier League where the teams was divided into two different groups.

The inaugural season for the new second-tier league started in 2004 with 18 teams divided into 2 groups.

Between 2004 and 2006, Malaysia Premier League was divided into two groups of 8 teams:

At the end of the season, the top team from each group of the Premier League was promoted to the Malaysia Super League. The teams which finished bottom of each group were relegated to the Malaysia FAM League. The two group champions also faced-off to determine the Malaysia Premier League championship.

2007 league revamp as a single group

For the 2006-07 season, the Malaysia Premier League was reorganised into a single league of 11 teams instead of being a competition involving two separate groups of teams. There were less amount of teams due to more teams was promoted to Malaysia Super League as part of the league expansion and some other withdrew from Malaysia Premier League.

For 2007 onwards, Malaysia Premier League was combined into one single league.

2010 league season with 12 teams

Over the years since its formation, the league has witnessed numerous changes to its format in order to accommodate the changes to rules and number of teams competing in the league where only since 2010 the number of teams competing has been stabilized with 12 teams.

In 2015, Football Malaysia LLP was created in the course of privatisation of the Malaysian football league system. The partnership saw all 24 teams of Malaysia Super League and Malaysia Premier League including FAM as the Managing Partner and MP & Silva as a special partner (FAM's global media and commercial advisor) to become stakeholders in the company. The company owns, operates and runs five entities in Malaysian football under its jurisdiction, which include Malaysia Super League, the Malaysia Premier League, the Malaysia FA Cup, the Malaysia Cup and the Charity Shield. It aims to transform and move Malaysian football forward.

Club Licensing Regulations

Every team in the Malaysia Premier League must have a licence to play in the league, or else they are relegated. To obtain a licence, teams must be financially healthy and meet certain standards of conduct as organisations. As part of privation effort for the league, all clubs compete in MSL and MPL will be required to obtained FAM Club Licensing.

As a preliminary preparation towards the total privatisation of the league, FAM Club Licensing Regulation is being created with the hope of it being enforced throughout MSL fully by the end of 2018 and MPL by end of 2019.

Privatisation of league football clubs

In November 2016, Melaka United Soccer Association became the third FAM affiliates to separate itself from the management of football team with the privatisation of its football team as separate entity called as Melaka United Football Club for 2017 Malaysia Super League season onwards. The other two are Pahang Football Association with Pahang F.C. and Johor Football Association with Johor Darul Ta'zim F.C. in early 2016.

The state Football Association such as Johor Football Association will now changing its focus to state football development and managing state league.

In February 2017, FMLLP has released a statement regarding the official status of Johor Darul Ta'zim and Johor Darul Ta'zim II where Johor Darul Ta'zim II has now become an official feeder club for Johor Darul Ta'zim since the feeder club agreement between both club has been approved in 19 Ogos 2016. Through the agreement, both clubs will be allowed additional four players transfer quota which can be used outside normal transfer windows for player between both clubs. The feeder club will also required to register a minimum of 12 players under the age of 23 for its squad from 2017. A feeder club will be required to be in the league below the main club at all times which mean Johor Darul Ta'zim II will never be allowed to reach promotion even if the club managed to win the Malaysia Premier League. By 2018, the feeder club must field four players under the age of 23 in their first eleven during match day and the feeder club is not allowed to play in other cup competition where the parent club compete such as Malaysia Cup and Malaysia FA Cup.

Logo evolution

Since the inception of the league as the second-tier league in 2004, numerous logo has been introduced for the league to reflect the sponsorship purpose. In its inaugural season, Dunhill logo was incorporated as title sponsors and it was the only season sponsored by the tobacco company before tobacco advertising was banned in the country. From 2004 to 2010, the Malaysia Premier League incorporated the TM brand as part of its logo as the title sponsor. After the end of TM sponsorship for seven consecutive years, FAM launched a new logo for the 2011 season where it has been partnering with Astro Media as strategic partner for MSL marketing. The Astro brand was only incorporated as part of the MSL logo from 2012 season until the end of 2014 season. In 2015 season, no title sponsor was incorporated when the league was sponsored by MP & Silva. For 2016 season a new logo was introduced as part of the takeover of the league by FMLLP where 100PLUS has been announced as title sponsor.

Finances

The FMLLP will introduce the merit-point system starting in 2016 season. Points will be awarded based on a team’s league position, progress in the Cup competitions (FA Cup and Malaysia Cup) and the number of live matches shown. A point in season’s Malaysian League will be worth RM41,000.

The money will be distribute twice per season. First during early season where the team will received a basic payment out of that particular year league sponsorship and the second payment will be received at the end of the season where all merit-point has been calculated. For 2016 season, the first basic payment will consist of 30 percent cut out of RM 70 Million league sponsorship that equal to RM 21 million which will be distributed among 24 teams of Malaysia Super League and Malaysia Premier League.

Team in Malaysian league has quite often involved in financial problem as their spending is more than their revenue. The Professional Footballers Association of Malaysia (PFAM) is one of the active member in pursuing the issue of unpaid salaries. In January 2016, PFAM president's suggest a couple solutions to promote financial sustainability on the competing team's part where the team's should make long-term investments by operating according to their budgets and requiring teams wage bills to be no bigger than 60 percent of their total spending. Other suggestion including for the salaries to be deducted directly from team grants and winning prizes, for points to be deducted from teams experiencing payment issues, and a ruling that requires teams to settle all their late salary payments before the start of every new season.

In response to this issues, FMLLP decided starting 2016 season, football clubs would be given warnings with the deduction of three league points if they failed to pay player's salary. If the problem persists, it will affect the licence of the clubs. When the club licence is withdrawn, the team will not be able to compete next season. If the team don't adopt the right structure, they will be left behind and club licensing will be a problem for them, and the team will drop out from competing in the league.

Other than this, each teams do raise revenue from sponsorship from local, regional and international sponsors for their team.

Media Coverage

Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM), a free-to-air channel has been broadcasting Malaysian league for a years even before the formation of Malaysia Super League. They continued to broadcast the league most of the times exclusively until end of 2010 where Astro Media was announced as sponsors and to manage the broadcasting right of the league for four years spanning from 2011 until 2014 season. During this time, the league was broadcast on one of the cable channel of Astro Media, which is Astro Arena alongside the RTM for the free-to-air broadcast. In 2015, Astro lost the broadcasting right for the league where the right was given to Media Prima, a parent company of multiple free-to-air channel alongside the broadcast with RTM. The broadcasting right for 2016 season has been given to Media Prima for 3 years with a maximum of three games in each gameweek will be shown live on television.

Although the broadcasting rights were held by the broadcasters, the Malaysia Premier League has not shown live matches for quite some time as most of the production has been fully utilised for the Malaysia Super League matches. As a result, most of the time, matches from Malaysia Premier League were only shown as highlights for the sports news segment.

Clubs

PDRM and Terengganu were relegated to 2017 Malaysia Premier League from 2016 Malaysia Super League.

MIFA and PKNP were promoted to Malaysia Premier League after securing place as champions and runners-up in 2016 Malaysia FAM League.

Stadiums and locations

Champions

Since Malaysia Premier League inception as second-tier league in 2004, Kedah has become the most winners of Malaysia Premier League with two titles.

Best performing teams

Table below is the list of number of championship wins by winners since 2004.

Great Honours

Great honours for Premier League are titled for the team who won 2 trophies (double) and 3 trophies (treble) in the same season. It covers Malaysia Premier League, Malaysia FA Cup and Malaysia Cup.

Golden Boot Winners

Below is the list of golden boot winners of Malaysia Premier League since its inception as second-tier league in 2004.

Foreign players

Foreign players policy has changed multiple times since the league inception. In 2009, FAM took a drastic measure when they change the foreign players policy when they were banned from playing in the league until 2011. Foreign players were only allowed be back to the league starting from the 2012 season onwards.

All foreign players must obtain International Transfer Certificate from their previous national football governing body that their previous clubs affiliated before they can be register with FAM in order to play in Malaysia Premier League.