Revealing the list of naturalized players of U23 Malaysia participating in the Southeast Asian tournament

(Dan Tri) - Malaysian media revealed that the country's U23 team held a personnel selection process before announcing the list of players participating in the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament.

The U23 Southeast Asian Championship will take place from July 15 to July 29 in Indonesia. At this time, football teams in the region are bustling with preparations for the tournament.

As for the U23 Malaysia team, this team is very determined in the U23 Southeast Asian tournament. According to the Malaysian media, Malaysian football is organizing a series of matches called Elite Games (top matches) for young players in the age group of 23.

Finnish-born player Nooa Laine (10) will play for the Malaysian U23 team at the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament (Photo: FAM).

These matches will take place over 3 days from June 23 to June 25, with the aim of selecting 30 players for the U23 Malaysia team, aiming for the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament. The list of 30 players will be announced on July 1.

Currently, 7 national players are likely to be on the list of the U23 Malaysia team participating in the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament. These 7 players include central defenders Ubaidullah Shamsul Fazili, Harith Haiqal, left-back Gabriel Palmero, midfielder Nooa Laine, strikers Haqimi Azim Rosli, Arif Aiman ​​Hanapi and Fergus Tierney.

Among them, Gabriel Palmero (Spanish origin), Nooa Laine (born in Finland) and Fergus Tierney (Scotland) are naturalized players.

This is a detail showing that U23 Malaysia wants to achieve high results at the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament. In the most recent Southeast Asian U23 tournament, U23 Malaysia lost to U23 Vietnam in the semi-finals.

Malaysian football wants to win the Southeast Asian U23 championship (Photo: Asean Football).

However, things are changing for Malaysian football. The national team with many naturalized players won 4-0 against Vietnam on June 10, in the third qualifying round of the 2027 Asian Cup.

Now, Malaysian football also wants their U23 team to do the same thing, which is to change and be able to defeat the current U23 champion Vietnam at the Southeast Asian youth tournament.

“We have many young players who represent the future of Malaysian football. I will discuss carefully with Malaysia national team coach Petr Cklamovski to give opportunities to Malaysian national players to play for the U23 team,” said Malaysia U23 coach Nafuzi Zain.

“This is an important preparation step for U23 Malaysia for the U23 Southeast Asian tournament. The Elite Games will help us evaluate and give opportunities to deserving players,” added coach Nafuzi Zain.

At the 2025 Southeast Asian U23 tournament, U23 Malaysia is in Group A with Indonesia, Philippines and Brunei. If they pass the group stage, Malaysia can meet U23 Vietnam in the semi-finals.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/the-thao/he-lo-danh-sach-cau-thu-nhap-tich-cua-u23-malaysia-du-giai-dong-nam-a-20250623185715907.htm