2020 Malaysia Premier League

Malaysia Premier League

Season	2020
Dates	29 February – 31 October 2020
Champions	Penang 1st Second Division title
Promoted	Penang Kuala Lumpur
Matches played	66
Goals scored	191 (2.89 per match)
Top goalscorer	Casagrande (9 goals)
Biggest home win	Perak II 5–1 Kuching (5 September 2020)
Biggest away win	7 goals Selangor II 1–6 Johor Darul Ta'zim II (20 September 2020)
Highest scoring	9 goals Kuala Lumpur 5–4 Selangor II (25 September 2020)
Longest winning run	6 matches Penang
Longest unbeaten run	10 matches Penang
Longest winless run	6 matches Kuching Kelantan United
Longest losing run	6 matches Kelantan United
Total attendance	47,974[a]
Average attendance	2,821[a]
← 2019 2021 →

The 2020 Malaysia Premier League was the 17th season of the Malaysia Premier League, the second-tier professional football league in Malaysia since its establishment in 2004.

The season started on 29 February and should end on 20 July 2020. However, on 13 March, it was announced that the league would be suspended indefinitely, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. On 1 May, it was announced that the league would resume in September dependent on the situation at the time. Due to time constraints, the home-and-away format for the Super League and the Premier League has been scrapped. Teams played each other only once, meaning the champions of the Super League and Premier League were decided after eleven rounds of matches.^[1]

Team changes

A total of 12 teams contested the league, including 7 sides from the 2019 season, 3 relegated from the 2019 Malaysia Super League and 2 promoted from the 2019 Malaysia M3 League.

To Premier League Relegated from Super League Perak II Selangor II^1 Kuala Lumpur FA Promoted from Liga M3 Kelantan United Kuching

From Premier League Promoted to Super League PDRM Sabah UiTM[2] Relegated to Liga M3 Sarawak

Renamed/Rebranded Clubs

• PKNP FC was renamed as Perak FA II and designated as the reserve team of Perak FA.
• In a desperate move by Football Association of Sarawak (FAS), FAS bought Selangor United and rebranded it as Sarawak United and located to Kuching, Sarawak in an attempt to return to Malaysian Premier League and regain their "honour".^[3][4]

Notes:

^1 PKNS was demoted to Premier League after their absorption to Selangor, change their status as reserve team, and renamed as Selangor II.^[5] UiTM FC was promoted to Super League as replacement.

Stadium and locations

Negeri Sembilan

Penang

Kuala Lumpur FA

Kuching, Sarawak United

Perak II

Terengganu II

Johor Darul Ta'zim II

Selangor II, UKM

Kelantan United, Kelantan

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Locations of teams in the 2018 Malaysia Premier League teams

Note: Table lists in alphabetical order.

Team	Location	Stadium	Capacity
Johor Darul Ta'zim II	Larkin	Tan Sri Dato Haji Hassan Yunos Stadium	30,000[6]
Kelantan	Kota Bharu	Sultan Muhammad IV Stadium^[1]	22,000[7]
Kelantan United	Kota Bharu	Sultan Muhammad IV Stadium	22,000
Kuala Lumpur FA	Kuala Lumpur	Kuala Lumpur Stadium	18,000[8]
Kuching	Kuching	Sarawak Stadium	40,000
Negeri Sembilan	Seremban	Tuanku Abdul Rahman Stadium	45,000[9]
Perak II	Manjung	Manjung Stadium	15,000
Penang	George Town	City Stadium	25,000
Sarawak United	Kuching	Sarawak Stadium	40,000
Selangor II	Selayang	Selayang Stadium	16,000
Terengganu II	Kuala Terengganu	Sultan Ismail Nasiruddin Shah Stadium	15,000
UKM	Selayang	Selayang Stadium	16,000

Personnel and sponsoring

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

Team	Head coach	Captain	Kit manufacturer	Shirt sponsor(s)
Johor Darul Ta'zim II	Rafa Gil	Nico Fernandez	Nike	-
Kelantan	Yusri Che Lah	Nazrin Nawi	PUC Sport Archived 2021-10-26 at the Wayback Machine	After Image
Kelantan United	Zahasmi Ismail[10]	Shahrizan Ismail	SkyHawk	Visit Kelantan 2020
Kuala Lumpur FA	Nidzam Adzha	Paulo Josué	Puma	KL BACA 2020
Kuching	Ideris Untong	Rafiezan Razali	StarSport	Kuching
Negeri Sembilan	Sazali Saidon	Kaharuddin Rahman	Admiral	Visit Negeri Sembilan
Perak II	Abu Bakar Fadzim	Sukri Hamid	Kelme	Visit Perak (home) & Pangkor Duty Free Island (away)
Penang	Manzoor Azwira	Azmi Muslim	Stallion Apparel	Pulau Pinang
Sarawak United	E. Elavarasan	Amri Yahyah	Joma	Press Metal
Selangor II	Rusdi Suparman	Sharul Nazeem	Joma	PKNS
Terengganu II	Roshadi Wahab	Bruno Suzuki	Al-Ikhsan	redONE
UKM	Sulaiman Hussin	Asnan Ahmad	Line 7	SUKIPT

Coaching changes

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

Team	Outgoing coach	Manner of departure	Date of vacancy	Position in table	Incoming coach	Date of appointment
Johor Darul Ta'zim II	Ervin Boban	End of contract	n/a	Pre-season	Rafa Gil[11]	9 November 2019
Selangor II	K. Rajagopal	End of contract	22 November 2019		Michael Feichtenbeiner	17 December 2019
Negeri Sembilan	Zaki Sheikh Ahmad	End of caretaker spell	April 2019		Sazali Saidon[12]	19 December 2019
Terengganu II	Tengku Hazman	End of contract	n/a		Roshadi Wahab	December 2019
Sarawak United	Abdul Talib Sulaiman	End of contract	n/a		E. Elavarasan	4 February 2020

Foreign players

The number of foreign players is restricted to four each team including at least one player from the AFC country.

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

Club	Player 1	Player 2	Player 3	AFC player	Former player ^4
Johor Darul Ta'zim II	Nicolas Fernandez	Luis Cabrera	Fernando Rodriguez	Kei Hirose
Kelantan	Masaki Watanabe	Felix Odili	Lazarus Kaimbi		Kang Seung-jo
Kelantan United	Aylton Alemão	Adil Kouskous	Alfusainney Gassama[13]	Selwan Al Jaberi
Kuala Lumpur FA	Paulo Josué[14]	Nicolás Dul[15]	Francis Koné	Azamat Baimatov[16]
Kuching	Bryan Jones Anicézio	Hudson Jesus	Yuta Suzuki	Yuki Tanigawa
Negeri Sembilan	Matheus Vila	Igor Carioca	Almir	Shunsuke Nakatake[17]
Perak II	Bruno Bezerra	Sacha Petshi	Tarik Isic	Yaren Sözer
Penang	Rafael Vitor	Endrick	Casagrande[18]	Lee Chang-hoon
Sarawak United	Demerson	Gabriel Guerra	Patrick Wleh	Milad Zanidpour	Nicolás Marotta
Selangor II	Bajram Nebihi			Armin Maier[19]
Terengganu II	Argzim Redžović[20]	Dechi Marcel	Jordan Mintah[21]	Bruno Suzuki
UKM	Ignatius Adukor	Julián Bottaro	Akanni-Sunday Wasiu	Lee Seong-woo	Amadaiya Rennie Kevin Osei

• ^4 Foreign players who left their clubs or were de-registered from playing squad due to medical issues or other matters.

Results

League table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Penang (P)	11	8	2	1	24	8	+16	26	Promotion to Super League
2	Terengganu II[b]	11	7	1	3	17	14	+3	22
3	Kuala Lumpur (P)	11	6	3	2	21	14	+7	21	Promotion to Super League
4	Kuching	11	5	1	5	17	19	−2	16
5	Johor Darul Ta'zim II[b]	11	4	3	4	20	17	+3	15
6	Kelantan	11	5	3	3	14	11	+3	15[c]
7	Selangor II[b]	11	4	1	6	17	23	−6	13
8	Kelantan United	11	4	0	7	13	19	−6	12
9	UKM	11	3	3	5	11	17	−6	12	Withrew Next Season
10	Sarawak United	11	3	2	6	14	16	−2	11
11	Negeri Sembilan	11	3	2	6	12	20	−8	11
12	Perak II[b]	11	1	5	5	11	13	−2	8

Updated to match(es) played on 31 October 2020. Source: MFL
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Goal difference; 3) Number of goals scored.
(P) Promoted
Notes:

1. Excluding matches played behind closed doors.
2. Johor Darul Ta'zim II, Perak II, Selangor II and Terengganu II cannot be promoted from Malaysia Premier League and play in Malaysia Cup as Johor Darul Ta'zim F.C., Perak FA, Selangor F.C. and Terengganu FC (their parent clubs) remain in Malaysia Super League and play in Malaysia Cup. Should the team be relegated to Malaysia Premier League or will not play in Malaysia Cup, Johor Darul Ta'zim II, Perak II, Selangor II and Terengganu II will have to drop to Malaysia M3 League or will play in Malaysia Cup.
3. Kelantan have been docked three points following the club’s failure to comply with FIFA’s decision.

Result table

Home \ Away	JDT	KEL	KLU	KUL	KUC	NSE	PRK	PEN	SUD	SEL	TFCII	UKM
Johor Darul Ta'zim II			3–2	1–1	-	-	1–1	1–2	-	-	-	-
Kelantan	-		1–1	2–0	-		1–0	0–3	1–0	-	-	-
Kelantan United	-	-		0–2	2–1	3–0	-	-	-		2–3	-
Kuala Lumpur	-		-			3–1	-	-	-	5–4	4–1	2–1
Kuching		2–0	-	-		-	-	-	2–1	1–4	1–2	1–2
Negeri Sembilan	1–3	-	-	-	2–4		-	-		2–1	1–0	2–0
Perak II	-	-	0–1		5–1	0–0		1–1	2–2	-	-	-
Penang	-	-	-	2–1	0–0	2–0			4–2	4–1		-
Sarawak United	4–1	-	2–1	1–2	-	-	-	-		-
Selangor II	1–6	0–0	-	-	-	-	2–1	-	1–0		0–1
Terengganu II	2–3	2–1	-	-	-	-	2–0		-	-		2–2
UKM	0–0	1–5	-	-	-	-		1–2	-	-	-

Updated to match(es) played on 27 September 2020. Source: MFL
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.
For upcoming matches, an "a" indicates there is an article about the rivalry between the two participants.

Season statistics

Top scorers

As of matches played on 31 October 2020.^[22]

Players sorted first by goals, then by last name.

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Casagrande	Penang	9
2	Endrick Santos	Penang	8
3	Francis Koné	Kuala Lumpur	7
	Danial Asri	Selangor II
	Fernando Rodríguez	Johor Darul Ta'zim II
	Jordan Mintah	Terengganu F.C. II

Hat-tricks

Player	For	Against	Result	Date
Casagrande	Penang	Selangor II	4 – 1 (H)	7 March 2020
Hakimi Abdullah	Kelantan	UKM	1 – 5 (A)	22 August 2020
Endrick Santos	Penang	Kelantan	0 – 3 (A)	29 August 2020

Clean sheets

As of matches played on 25 September 2020.

Players sorted first by clean sheets, then by last name.

Rank	Player	Club	Clean sheets
1	Samuel Somerville	Penang	3
	Remezey Che Ros	UKM
	Kaharuddin Rahman	Negeri Sembilan
	Fikri Che Soh	Kelantan
4	Suhaimi Hussin	Terengganu II	2
6	Faridzuean Kamaruddin	Kelantan	1
	Farhan Majid	Perak II
	Firdaus Irman	Selangor II
	Haziq Nadzli	Johor Darul Ta'zim II
	Iqbal Suhaimi	Kuching
	Shahrizan Ismail	Kelantan United
	Sikh Izhan	Selangor II
	Syazwan Yusoff	Kelantan United
	Zamir Selamat	Kuala Lumpur

See also

• 2020 Malaysia Super League
• 2020 Malaysia FA Cup
• 2020 Malaysia Cup

References

1. "September restart for M-League". nst.com.my. 1 May 2020.
2. "UiTM FC naik ke Liga Super dan PKNS, PKNP turun ke Liga Perdana". Sarawak Crocs. 13 November 2019.
3. "Selangor United sah jadi Sarawak United". Semuanya Bola. 13 December 2019.
4. "Penjenamaan Selangor United ke Sarawak United menyelamatkan maruah?". Sarawak Crocs. 7 December 2019.
5. "Selangor II bakal beraksi di Stadium Selayang". Football Tribe. 3 December 2019.
6. "FAM League Recap: Sime Darby, UKM secure promotion". Sports247.my. Retrieved 5 November 2017.
7. "Sultan Muhammad IV". Sejarah Kelantan. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
8. "City Boys banking on stadium renovation completion to draw KL-ites back in 2018 MSL". Goal.com. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
9. "Tuanku Abdul Rahman Stadium". Seremban Municipan Council. Archived from the original on March 14, 2017. Retrieved 5 November 2017.
10. "Kelantan United mahu lakukan kejutan". Utusan Online. Archived from the original on 2019-03-06. Retrieved 2019-12-15.
11. "Rafael Gil diumumkan sebagai jurulatih baharu JDT II". Vocket FC. 9 November 2019.
12. "Negeri Sembilan appoint Sazali Saidon as new head coach". 19 December 2019.
13. "Kelantan United kekalkan Gassama Alfusainey". Semuanya Bola. 13 December 2019.
14. "Paulo Josue tandatangani kontrak lanjutan bersama The City Boys". 19 December 2019.
15. "Dul, Raimi lengkapkan skuad KL".^{[permanent dead link‍]}
16. "Baimatov menara pertahanan baru KL". Sportimes Malaysia. January 2020.
17. "Shunsuke Nakatake kekal bersama Skuad Rusa". Bernama. 12 June 2019.
18. "Casagrande kekal Haria bersama Harimau Kumbang buru promosi ke Liga Super". Semuanya Bola. 16 December 2019.
19. "At the moment, I am playing for Selangor II as a foreigner". 9 August 2020.
20. "Terengganu II sambar khidmat Argzim Redzovic". Vocket FC. 3 December 2019.
21. "Jordan Mintah bakal warnai Liga Premier". Terengganu FC Official. 8 December 2019.
22. "Penjaring gol Liga Premier 2019". Liga Malaysia. Retrieved 29 February 2020.

External links

• Football Association of Malaysia website
• Football Malaysia LLP website