Young Lions FC

This article is about of the developmental Singapore Premier League club. For the national age-group team, see Singapore national under-23 football team.

Young Lions

Full name	Young Lions Football Club
Nickname(s)	Merlion Cubs
Short name	YGL
Founded	2002;22 years ago (2002)
Ground	Jalan Besar Stadium
Capacity	10,000
Owner	Football Association of Singapore
Chairman	Farehan Hussein
Head coach	Nazri Nasir
League	Singapore Premier League
2023	Singapore Premier League, 9th of 9
Home colours Away colours
Current season

Young Lions Football Club, commonly known as Young Lions, is a Singaporean developmental football club that in Kallang, Singapore, which competes in the Singapore Premier League. The team is under the direct control of the Football Association of Singapore.

Young Lions are one of the few football clubs in the world that is made up of young Singaporean footballers serving their compulsory two-year national service which place an age restriction on team members while playing in a top-flight professional league. Players are on loan in from several local Singapore Premier League club every season and would spend two years with the side before returning to their previous professional club.

Young Lions plays their home matches at the Jalan Besar Stadium. Their best league finish was third, which they achieved in 2004 and 2006.

History

Goal

By entering the Young Lions into the S.League, the FAS hopes to expose young players to top-level competition, thus helping to prepare them for international tournaments such as the Southeast Asian Games. While the bulk of the Young Lions squad is made up of members of Singapore's national under-23 team, the club also takes in promising young foreign players (e.g. Luka Savić). However, foreign players are normally only recruited into the Young Lions squad if they could potentially change their nationality to Singaporean and be eligible to play international football for Singapore at some point in the future.

In 2023, Young Lions signed both Japanese duo Jun Kobayashi and Kan Kobayashi from Albirex Niigata (S) who became the foreign players playing for the club for the first time since signing France national, Benjamin Bertrand from Ligue 2 club, Tours in 2016. In preparation for the upcoming 2024–25 Singapore Premier League season, Young Lions signed an additional two more Japanese players, Kaisei Ogawa and Itsuki Enomoto and also signing Australian national Rashid Hayek from Western United making it the first time the club has five foreigners registered in the squad.

Malaysian domestic competition

In 2011, the Football Association of Singapore and the Football Association of Malaysia reached an agreement that would see greater cooperation between the two nations. One of the intended avenues will see Young Lions play in the Malaysian Super League and Malaysia Cup from 2012 onwards, the first time a Singaporean team has participated in Malaysian domestic football since Singapore won the 1994 M-League and Malaysia Cup double. Although the new Singapore team will have the existing Young Lions set up at its core, the squad will be permitted up to five local players over the age of 14–16 players, as well as a number of overseas players in accordance with the quota set out by the rules of the Malaysian competitions the team will play in. ^[1]

Ultimately though, a new team was created for the Malaysia league: the LionsXII, while Young Lions remained in the S.League.

National Football Academy

Most of the Young Lions players come from the NFA (National Football Academy) and new players (from the NFA) will be promoted to the Young Lions squad every season.

The National Football Academy enters both the Singapore NFA U-17 and Singapore NFA U-18 teams into the Prime League to allow their players to gain more exposure and match experience by playing against older and more established players. ^[2]

Stadium

Pitchside view of the Jalan Besar Stadium, November 2008

Main article: Jalan Besar Stadium

Young Lions had played at the Jalan Besar Stadium since their inception of participating in the S.League. The stadium can holds up a seating capacity of 8,000. In 2012, As part of the LionsXII's sponsorship by Kingsmen, a local fan club, the King George's Stand was built using a removable stand, increasing the stadium's capacity to 10,000.

On 30 October 2012, an LED scoreboard was implemented at the Gallery stand to provide better quality video to the spectators, allowing replay video highlights of the action on the field during matchdays. Two new screens were also placed at the two ends of the Grandstand, North and South, to enable better match experience for the Gallery fans.

Sponsorship and naming history

Year	Sponsors	Club name	References
2011–2015	Courts	Courts Young Lions	[3]
2016–2017	Garena	Garena Young Lions	[4]

Players

As of 30 May 2024 ^[5]

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player 1 GK   SGP Aizil Yazid 2 DF   SGP Raoul Suhaimi 3 DF   SGP Aqil Yazid 4 DF   SGP Ikram Mikhail 5 DF   JPN Jun Kobayashi 6 DF   SGP Syafi'i Hilman 7 MF   JPN Kan Kobayashi 8 MF   JPN Kaisei Ogawa 9 FW   JPN Itsuki Enomoto 10 MF   SGP Amir Syafiz 11 MF   SGP Farhan Zulkifli (vice-captain) 12 FW   SGP Danish Haziq 13 GK   SGP Rauf Erwan 14 DF   SGP Wong Ngang Haang 15 DF   SGP Kieran Teo (vice-captain) 16 MF   SGP Fathullah Rahmat 18 FW   SGP Samuel Pillai 19 DF   SGP Andrew Aw 20 MF   SGP Fairuz Fazli 21 FW   SGP Danish Haqimi 22 DF   SGP Febryan Pradana

No. Pos. Nation Player 23 GK   SGP Travis Ang 24 FW   SGP Danish Qayyum 25 MF   SGP Izz Anaqi 26 DF   SGP Nur Adam Abdullah 27 MF   SGP Sahoo Garv 29 FW   SGP Lim Zheng Wu 31 DF   SGP Ryaan Sanizal (captain) 32 GK   SGP Umayr Sujuandy 33 MF   SGP Ethan Pinto 37 DF   AUS Rashid Hayek 40 DF   SGP Haziq Riduan 41 DF   SGP Akash Rai 42 FW   SGP Khairin Nadim 45 MF   SGP Nyqil Iyyan 55 MF   SGP Jonan Tan 77 DF   SGP Danial Crichton — MF   SGP Rasul Ramli — MF   SGP Iman Hakim — MF   SGP Syady Sufwan — GK   SGP Firman Nabil — MF   SGP Ryu Hardy

Players on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player — DF   SGP Andrew Aw (National Service till 2025)

Technical staff

Position	Name
Team Manager	Sakthi Vel Ganesan
Head coach	Nazri Nasir
Assistant coach	Fadzuhasny Juraimi Kosei Nakamura Afiq Yahya
Goalkeeper coach	Ahmadulhaq Che Omar
Fitness coach	Donald Wan
Physiotherapist	Alex Poon
Sports Trainer	Ryan Wang Jasmori Rasip
Equipment Officer	Omar Mohamed

Source: ^[6]

Performance in domestic competitions

Season	League	Pos.	Pld	W	D	L	GS	GA	Pts	Singapore Cup	League Cup
2003	S.League	12th	33	6	1–5	21	33	77	25	Quarter-finals
2004		3rd	27	14	5	8	74	52	47	Quarter-finals
2005		6th	27	12	6	9	44	37	42	Quarter-finals
2006		3rd	30	15	7	8	67	43	52	Quarter-finals
2007		5th	33	13	8	12	45	54	47	Preliminary	Withdrew
2008		9th	33	7	10	16	30	46	31	Semi-finals	Semi-finals
2009		8th	30	9	7	14	33	48	34	Preliminary	Group stage
2010		9th	33	9	12	12	37	45	34	Semi-finals	Preliminary
2011		9th	33	7	6	20	33	54	27	Withdrew	Withdrew
2012		10th	24	6	5	13	25	37	23	Withdrew	Group stage
2013		12th	27	5	3	19	20	52	18	Preliminary	Group stage
2014		10th	27	7	5	15	38	54	26	Did not participate	Did not participate
2015		9th	27	7	6	14	30	43	27	Did not participate	Did not participate
2016		9th	24	2	3	19	23	70	9	Preliminary	Did not participate
2017		9th	24	1	3	20	10	62	6	Did not participate	Did not participate
2018	Singapore Premier League	7th	24	5	6	13	25	46	21	Did not participate
2019		8th	24	6	4	14	21	38	22	Did not participate
2020		7th	14	3	0	11	12	38	9	Not Held
2021		7th	21	4	4	13	26	50	16	Not Held
2022		8th	28	2	2	24	34	103	8	Group Stage
2023		9th	24	1	2	21	24	76	5	Group Stage

• 2003 saw the introduction of penalty shoot-outs if a match ended in a draw in regular time. Winners of penalty shoot-outs gained two points instead of one.

Notable foreign players

Asia

• Craig Foster (1991)
• Li Jisheng (2006)
• Che Hao (2006)
• Guan Hongyu (2006)
• Yan Minghao (2006)
• Yang Mu (2009)
• Kim Seong-kyu (2010)
• Seo Su-jong (2010)
• Jun Kobayashi (2023–)
• Kan Kobayashi (2023–)

Europe

• Sirina Camara (2012)
• Jonathan Toto (2012–2013)
• Benjamin Bertrand (2016)
• Vladan Seric (2004)
• Luka Savić (2010)
• Daniel Hammond (2008)
• Benjamin Lee (2013)
• Armin Maier (2017)

Africa

• Moudourou Moise (2006–2008)
• Kazeem Babatunde (2003–2004)
• Greg Nwokolo (2005)
• Obadin Aikhena (2008–2009)

North America

• Jordan Webb (2014–2016)
• Sherif El-Masri (2012–2015)

Managerial history

No.	Manager	Years
1	P. N. Sivaji	1 January 2003–31 December 2003
2	Kim Poulsen	1 January 2004–31 December 2004
3	Fandi Ahmad	1 January 2005–31 December 2006
4	V. Sundramoorthy	1 January 2007–31 December 2008
5	Terry Pathmanathan	1 January 2009–13 January 2010
6	V. Sundramoorthy (2)	14 January 2010–31 December 2010
7	Robin Chitrakar	1 January 2011–13 January 2013
8	Aide Iskandar	14 January 2013–11 June 2015
9	Jürgen Raab	1 July 2015–13 January 2016
10	Richard Tardy	1 January 2016–15 February 2016
11	Patrick Hesse	15 February 2016–9 November 2016
12	V. Selvaraj	9 November 2016–17 May 2017
13	Richard Tardy (2)	17 May 2017–27 July 2017
14	Vincent Subramaniam	5 August 2017–14 December 2017
15	Fandi Ahmad (2)	14 December 2017–31 December 2019
16	Nazri Nasir	1 January 2020–10 March 2021
17	Philippe Aw	11 March 2021–31 December 2021
18	Nazri Nasir (2)	1 January 2022–31 December 2022
19	Philippe Aw (2)	1 January 2023–18 May 2023
20	Fadzuhasny Juraimi (interim)	18 May 2023–12 July 2023
21	Nazri Nasir (3)	13 July 2023–present

Records and statistics

As of 8 July 2024.

Top 10 all-time appearances

Rank	Player	Years	Club appearances
1	Afiq Yunos	2008–2013	114
2	Syahrul Sazali	2016–2019 2021–2022	101
	Shahril Ishak	2003–2006
3	Syazwan Buhari	2010–2015	87
	Amirul Adli	2011–2017
	Hariss Harun	2007–2011
	Sherif El-Masri	2012–2015
7	Faritz Abdul Hameed	2009–2012	83
8	Hami Syahin	2015–2018 2020–2021	82
9	Khairul Amri	2004–2008, 2016	79

Top 10 all-time scorers

Rank	Player	Club appearances	Total goals
1	Khairul Amri	79	49
2	Agu Casmir	34	31
3	Shahril Ishak	101	20
4	Sherif El-Masri	87	18
	Qiu Li	27
6	Khairul Nizam	57	15
7	Jordan Webb	39	14
	Shi Jiayi	66
9	Ilhan Fandi	33	13
10	Sahil Suhaimi	38	12

• Biggest Wins: 7–1 vs Sinchi FC (23 September 2004)
• Heaviest Defeats: 1–10 vs Lion City Sailors (13 August 2022)
• Youngest Goal scorers: Khairin Nadim ~ 16 years 6 months 9 days old (On 17 November 2020 vs Tampines Rovers)
• Oldest Goal scorers: Khairul Amri ~ 31 years 06 months 11 days old (On 1 April 2023vs Geylang International)
• Youngest ever debutant: Raoul Suhaimi ~ 15 years 7 months 27 days old (On 15 May 2021 vs Albirex Niigata Singapore)

Last win against others Singapore Premier League club

Club	Score	Year	Match type
Albirex Niigata (S)	3–2	16 June 2024	2024–25 Singapore Premier League
Balestier Khalsa	4–2	14 August 2021	2021 Singapore Premier League
DPMM	3–1	27 July 2024	2024–25 Singapore Premier League
Geylang International	4–2	26 November 2023	2023 Singapore Cup
Hougang United	2–1	18 March 2023	2023 Singapore Premier League
Lion City Sailors (As Home United)	0–3	18 September 2019	2019 Singapore Premier League
Tanjong Pagar United	3–1	24 August 2024	2024–25 Singapore Premier League
Tampines Rovers	2–1	1 August 2018	2018 Singapore Premier League
Warriors	0–1	8 April 2018	2018 Singapore Premier League

Match brawl

On 7 September 2010, The S.League fixture between both Young Lions and Beijing Guoan Talent was abandoned in the 89th minute when a massive brawl erupted into violence. The referee and his assistants lost control. Its all started in the final 10 minutes of the game when the first fight broke out in the 84th minute. The match then continued with Afiq Yunos equalising for the Young Lions in the 88th minute. However, a tackle by Beijing's Yu Tianzhu on Young Lions, Nazrul Nazari in the middle of the field saw the match degenerate into a brawl involving both teams, including bench players. As seen in the YouTube video, several Beijing players went in with flying kicks on Gabriel Quak which he suffered an arm injury while Faritz Hameed was seen receiving a blow to the head as he was on the ground. Both Young Lions players were evacuated to the hospital. Beijing's goalkeeper, Su Boyang was also seen attempting to punch Khairul Nizam. Young Lions head coach, Eugene Loo stepped in to help cool down the tension but was in turn kicked in the back as well and fell over. To make matter worst, several fans were also spotted jumping into the field to fight. Even a medical personnel lost his cool and had to be held back. He was seen escorted away from the pitch while challenging the Beijing players to a fight.

Both clubs have been docked five points and fined $5,000 each. The FAS Disciplinary Committee has also concluded that the match will not be replayed and the result will stand.10 players from Beijing and 6 players from Young Lions have been charged for gross misconduct which brought the game into disrepute. Both teams have sinced apologised for the fight.

References

1. Singapore Lions to participate in 2012 Malaysia Cup  – Asia One, 12/07/11
2. "Prime League Table". S.League Official Website. 11 July 2012. Archived from the original on 19 December 2014. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
3. "Soccer-Singapore's Young Lions get name change, S$1 million". Reuters. 2011-01-27. Archived from the original on 2023-04-16. Retrieved 2023-04-16.
4. "Young Lions snare S$4m sponsorship deal - biggest in S.League history". TODAY. Archived from the original on 2023-04-16. Retrieved 2023-04-16.
5. "SPL 2023 Transfer Centre Club Guide: Young Lions". Singapore Premier League. 28 January 2023. Archived from the original on 16 January 2023. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
6. "Club Profile – Garena Young Lions". S-League. Archived from the original on 16 February 2016. Retrieved 3 February 2016.

External links

• Official website
• S.League website page on Young Lions ^[usurped]