PETALING JAYA, 11^th Nov: The owner of PJ City Football Club, QI Group, is paving the way for a new management takeover of the Malaysia Super League club, Petaling Jaya City FC (PJ City FC), with effect from end of the 2022 season.  

The QI Group is interested to welcome other parties to take over the holding equity and have been approached by several parties who are keen to take over the Club’s management. Discussions are still ongoing. 

The Group will continue to support the local football scene and will shift its focus on formulating a strategy to develop young players from grassroots and developing them into world-class players, particularly through a Football Academy, Talent Development Programs across the nation or a potential collaboration with our international partners in sports.  

Speaking at the press conference, Dato’ Sri Subahan Kamal, President of PJ City FC said, “We firmly believe that Malaysia has the talent, just like the players we had in the 60s, 70s and 80s and it is the vision of PJ City Club owner Dato’ Sri Vijay Eswaran to bring back the golden era of Malaysian football. We wish to continue supporting this agenda by widening our footprint nationwide and identifying and developing young talent from the grassroots.”  

PJ City, which made its debut in the Super League in 2019, became an all-Malaysian players team in 2021 and has been working very hard to nurture and develop local talent in Malaysia where we have so many young players with great potential just waiting to be tapped.  

Notably, PJ City, which was also represented in both the Youth League (Liga Belia) and the President Cup tournament, saw two of its young players being selected for the national Under-23 squad this year, besides contributing three players for the senior national team.  

In a league where foreign strikers dominate, PJ City’s Darren Lok has been a standout among the local talent. In fact, Darren emerged as the top scorer among local players in the just concluded Super League. Similarly, our keeper Kalamullah Al-Hafiz Mat Rowi and forwards V. Ruventhiran and Kogileswaran Raj also don the national colours. We would also like to pay tribute to the contribution by one of our stalwart players, the late P. Rajes who was a much-admired player, especially among the juniors. 

The QI Group has fostered and built a strong sense of community around the PJ City team by heavily investing in infrastructure development. 

“We have invested around RM 2.5 million towards upgrading the MBPJ stadium, our home venue for all games, which now has a new pitch, synthetic running track, and changing rooms. We are proud to contribute to the city of Petaling Jaya which has been the home of the QI Group for more than two decades,”  Dato’ Sri Subahan added. 

For the record, PJ City finished 8th in their debut season followed by 7th place finishing in 2020 and 2021 and completed the 2022 season in 9th place out of twelve teams that competed in the Super League. 

“We take this opportunity to thank the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM), the Malaysian Football League (MFL) our main sponsor QNET and other co-sponsors, stadium MBPJ management and most of all our fans for their fervent passion, the emotions they have showed with us through each of our game. We will treasure our memories and time in PJ City FC.”  

“We firmly believe PJ City and its players are well positioned for the future. We wish them every success going forward,” concluded Dato’ Sri Subahan.