Oh, for the good old Bola days!

COMMENT What to make of the flood of nostalgia that is carrying the movie Ola Bola to box office success?

The movie is a depiction of Malaysia's 1980 Moscow Olympics football team which qualified for the event but could not go to what would have been the country's second appearance at the quadrennial summit of sport.

But because of a boycott of the Moscow Olympics due to Russia's invasion of Afghanistan, Malaysia did not participate in the Games.

Eight years earlier at the Munich Olympics, a Malaysian team captained by M Chandran, took part for the first time in the football competition and although eliminated at the group stage, the quality of what was essentially the same team was validated by its bronze medal success at the 1974 Tehran Asian Games.

Munich '72, Tehran '74 and qualification for Moscow '80 were the components of a blue riband decade for Malaysian football in the 1970s...