Dutch East Indies - Football History
During the colonial era, two islandwide federations, the N.I.V.B. until 1935
and the N.I.V.U. after 1935, existed on Java (both included city
federations from other islands as associate members, but only after
World War II some of these obtained regular membership).
Even before the formation of an all-Java federation, the W.J.V.B.
(West Java Voetbal Bond, then the city federation of Batavia) had contacted
the S.C.C., the Singapore Cricket Club (the reigning football league champions of the
city), to invite a Singapore representative side to play matches in Batavia (against a
Batavia XI) and Semarang (against a Java representative side, at the occasion of the
Koloniale Tentoonstelling) in 1914. Originally,
prospective match dates in Semarang were October 5, 1914, for a Singapore civilian
side, and November 4, 1914, for a Singapore military team, but by July 1914, when
it had been agreed only one Singapore side (of 14 players, both civilian and
military) would travel, one match was planned in Semarang for 17 or 18 September
(after two matches in Batavia, on 12 and 13 September); the S.F.A. organised
a test match for the team to be sent to Java on 27 July and had fixtured a
second on 4 August, but at the beginning of August both that second test
match and the entire tour were cancelled due to the start of World War I.
On April 19, 1919, the N.I.V.B. (Nederlandsch-Indische Voetbal Bond) was founded by representatives of the four most important city federations of Java (those of Batavia, Soerabaja, Bandoeng and Semarang). It was officially affiliated to F.I.F.A. on May 24, 1924 (after provisional admission on April 15), and internationally represented the colony until it was liquidated in 1935. Its most noteworthy non-domestic activity was the participation at the 1934 Far Eastern Games in Manila (Oostersche Olympiade), the first international trip by an official Java selection.
The N.I.V.B. was liquidated in July 1935 following a year and a half of turmoil in Javanese football and succeeded by the N.I.V.U. (Nederlandsch-Indische Voetbal Unie), which was founded on June 9, 1935, and affiliated to F.I.F.A. on August 14, 1936 (after provisional admission on May 13). The N.I.V.U. was the first ever Asian federation to be represented at a World Cup, sending a team to the final tournament in France 1938. (The N.I.V.B. had earlier been represented at the 1928 Olympic Games in the Netherlands, in the person of its top referee, Max de Vries Foltynski, who refereed the match between Chile and Mexico in the consolation tournament and was linesman at six matches, including the final replay between Uruguay and Argentina.)
Apart from five clearly official matches (the three at the 1934 Far Eastern Games, the match against Hungary at the 1938 World Cup, and the friendly against the Netherlands three weeks later, which was however not recognised as an official match by the Dutch federation), which are shown in bold face (as are the four scheduled but eventually cancelled matches against the Philippines (1935), Japan and the United States (both World Cup qualifiers in 1938) and the touring China Olympic team in 1948), below all other (known) matches played by N.I.V.B. or N.I.V.U. representative sides are listed.
The first three N.I.V.B. matches (1921-1930) below are listed in [FIF 31] as Inter-Association Matches (with Loh Hwa rendered Lho Hwa), suggesting the N.I.V.B. considered them to be official matches (contemporary guidelines by F.I.F.A. left such decisions to the discretion of the hosting federation). However, they can not reasonably be counted as such (for one thing, the associations of neither Singapore nor Australia were members of F.I.F.A. at the time; moreover, the team from Singapore was a club side (S.C.C.) rather than an official representation from the S.A.F.A.).
The first ever official (and competitive) match of the Dutch East Indies was the 7-1 win over Japan at the 1934 Far Eastern Games in Manila, in which two players (Ludwich Jahn and Tio Hian Goan) scored hat-tricks, possibly a unique feat for the maiden international match of a country. The N.I.V.B. (by then reduced to a Soerabaja city selection enhanced by a handful of players from Makassar (marking the first time players from another island were included) and Malang) also entered the 1935 Philippines Championship in February and March, finishing runners-up, but did not play any official association teams there (a match against the Philippines scheduled for March 7 was cancelled as the Manila clubs refused to release players). A Manila selection paid a return visit in June, playing (among others) an N.I.V.B. representation best described as a scratch side.
During the summer of 1935, the N.I.V.B. was replaced by the N.I.V.U. as the
organisation responsible for football on Java (and increasingly other
islands of the Dutch East Indies), and after obtaining F.I.F.A. membership
in May 1936, the N.I.V.U. registered for the 1938 World Cup. After Japan,
meanwhile involved in a most brutal war of aggression in China, withdrew
from the qualifying tournament (whether for political reasons or because
of fearing a similar hammering as in 1934 is not clear), the F.I.F.A.
arbitrarily ordered an additional play-off between the Dutch East Indies
and the United States a week before the tournament in France, to be held
on Ascension Day 1938 in Rotterdam. However, the United States withdrew
for financial reasons (some sources state the United States withdrew
because they feared to have to play on Saturdays, but the actual reason
given to the F.I.F.A. in the last week of April was that the American
federation had hoped to finance the trip to France with the profits from
a match to be played against an English team on the occasion of the silver
jubilee of the American federation; however, that match did not take place
because the English refused to play on a Sunday, and therefore the American
federation could not pay for the trip to Europe). Thus, the N.I.V.U.
selection made its maiden appearance against eventual finalists Hungary,
one of the few countries with professional football in continental Europe.
After the tournament, the team played one more international match, against
the "mother country", which was not recognised by the Dutch federation as
a full international in spite of the fact that the Dutch side closely
corresponded to the full team (only the experimental forward line featured
four uncapped players, of which only one who would never win an official
international cap later).
After the second World War, the P.S.S.I. (first founded in 1930 as an ethnic
football federation on Java, but dissolved by the Japanese in 1942) was
resurrected in 1950 and obtained F.I.F.A. membership in 1952.
The N.I.V.U. (resurrected on December 29, 1946, and renamed V.U.V.S.I./I.S.N.I.S.
(Voetbal Unie in de Verenigde Staten van Indonesië/Ikatan Sepakraga Negara
Indonesia Serikat) on September 18, 1948) was disbanded in 1951 after its
city member federations had either joined the P.S.S.I. (Makassar, Medan), merged
with their local P.S.S.I. counterparts (Semarang, Surabaja), or been dissolved
(Bandung, Batavia/Djakarta). During this period there were no international matches
(nor was the territory represented in F.I.F.A.), partially due to the military
conflict between the Republic of Indonesia and the Netherlands. A match scheduled
for June 24, 1948 between a N.I.V.U. selection and the visiting Chinese Olympic team
was cancelled as permission from the Chinese National Amateur Athletic Federation
based in Nanking, necessary for an official international match, was sought after
too late.
For the matches of P.S.S.I. representations,
see the file on Indonesia International Matches.
NB: full international matches listed in bold face Date Venue Score Competition/Comments 28 Mar 1921 Batavia Dutch East Indies 1-0 Singapore C.C. 19 Aug 1928 Soerabaja Dutch East Indies 2-1 aet Australia XI 17 Aug 1930 Batavia Dutch East Indies 4-4 Loh Hwa (Shanghai) Abdullah-beker (Loh Hwa won on lots) 15 Apr 1934 Batavia Hercules/S.V.J.A. 2-3 Dutch East Indies test match Far Eastern Games 22 Apr 1934 Soerabaja S.V.B. (Soerabaja) 0-1 Dutch East Indies test match Far Eastern Games 25 Apr 1934 Soerabaja S.V.B. (Soerabaja) 3-7 Dutch East Indies test match Far Eastern Games 13 May 1934 Manila Dutch East Indies 7-1 Japan 10th Far Eastern Games 14 May 1934 Manila China 2-0 Dutch East Indies 10th Far Eastern Games 19 May 1934 Manila Philippines 3-2 Dutch East Indies 10th Far Eastern Games 23 May 1934 Makassar M.V.B. (Makassar) 3-1 Dutch East Indies 25 May 1934 Soerabaja S.V.B. (Soerabaja) 2-0 Dutch East Indies 14 Jul 1934 Soerabaja Dutch East Indies 1-4 Grazer Sport Club 16 Feb 1935 Manila Univ. of the Philippines 0-6 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 20 Feb 1935 Manila American/European Y.M.C.A. 0-6 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 25 Feb 1935 Manila University of Santo Tomás 0-5 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 27 Feb 1935 Manila De la Salle College 3-1 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 4 Mar 1935 Manila Casino Español 2-3 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 6 Mar 1935 Manila Malaya Command (Singapore) 2-1 Dutch East Indies Philippines Championship 7 Mar 1935 Manila Philippines n/p Dutch East Indies Philippines could not field a team 14 Apr 1935 Soerabaja Dutch East Indies 8-1 N.I.V.B. Chineesch XI 19 Apr 1935 Malang V.M.O. (Malang) 1-4 Dutch East Indies N.I.V.B. Paasch-Tournooi 20 Apr 1935 Soerabaja Vorstenlanden XI 3-2 Dutch East Indies N.I.V.B. Paasch-Tournooi 21 Apr 1935 Soerabaja S.V.B. (Soerabaja) 1-4 Dutch East Indies N.I.V.B. Paasch-Tournooi 10 Jun 1935 Malang Dutch East Indies 2-4 Manila XI
NB: full international matches listed in bold face Date Venue Score Competition/Comments 28 Jul 1936 Batavia Dutch East Indies 0-2 Wiener Sport Club 25 Jan 1938 Saigon Dutch East Indies w/o Japan World Cup 1938 qualifying; Japan scratched 26 Feb 1938 Solo V.B.S. (Solo) 3-6 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 27 Feb 1938 Djokjakarta V.B.D.O. (Djokja)/reserves 1-4 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 12 Mar 1938 Bandoeng V.B.B.O. (Bandoeng) 4-0 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 13 Mar 1938 Bandoeng V.B.B.O. (Bandoeng) 2-2 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 2 Apr 1938 Semarang V.S.O. (Semarang) 5-1 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 3 Apr 1938 Semarang Arabisch-Inlandsch XI 1-11 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 15 Apr 1938 Malang M.V.U. (Malang) 2-7 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 17 Apr 1938 Soerabaja H.B.S. 1-3 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 18 Apr 1938 Soerabaja S.V.B. (Soerabaja) 2-8 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 24 Apr 1938 Batavia V.B.O. (Batavia) 4-1 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 30 Apr 1938 Medan O.S.V.B. (Oost-Sumatra) 2-4 Dutch East Indies test match World Cup 1938 25 May 1938 Den Haag H.B.S. 2-2 Dutch East Indies 26 May 1938 Rotterdam Dutch East Indies w/o United States of America World Cup 1938 qualifying; USA scratched 31 May 1938 Haarlem Haarlem 3-5 Dutch East Indies 5 Jun 1938 Reims Hungary 6-0 Dutch East Indies World Cup 1938 14 Jun 1938 Rotterdam Sparta 4-3 Dutch East Indies 23 Jun 1938 Dordrecht D.F.C. 2-4 Dutch East Indies 26 Jun 1938 Amsterdam Netherlands 9-2 Dutch East Indies [!] Olympische Dag 28 Jun 1938 Den Haag H.V.B. (Den Haag) 2-0 Dutch East Indies 26 Dec 1939 Bandoeng V.B.B.O. (Bandoeng) 6-0 Dutch East Indies interprovinciale kampioenschappen 1939 24 Jun 1948 Batavia Dutch East Indies n/p China no permission C.N.A.A.F. [!] match not official for the Netherlands
Dutch East Indies - Football History
Sources included: [FIF 31], many contemporary newspapers from the Dutch East Indies
Prepared and maintained by Karel Stokkermans for the Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation
Author: Karel Stokkermans
(karel.rsssf@gmail.com)
Last updated: 4 Jun 2020
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