PETALING JAYA, July 19 — “Bring it on.”

That seems to be the message FA of Malaysia (FAM) have for critic Tunku Ismail Ibrahim after a combative press conference where they defended the much maligned Oceania tour.

FAM are also refusing to recognise the retirement of four Johor Darul Ta’zim players — Aidil Zafuan Abd Razak, Safiq Rahim, S Kunanlan and Amirulhadi Zainal — until they send in officials letters.

The quartet had only announced their intention to quit Harimau Malaysia on Facebook last week.

Zafuan and Safiq did so on Tuesday and Kunanlan and Amirulhadi followed suit two days later.

There was speculation they were forced to step down by JDT owner Tunku Ismail who has a running feud with the powers-that-be in Wisma FAM as well as national coach Datuk Ong Kim Swee.

Yesterday Tunku Ismail launched another “attack” on FAM saying he has a pen drive which contained evidence of corruption within FAM.

FAM secretary-general Datuk Hamidin Mohd Amin said: “We accept criticism but not everything as alleged by Tunku Ismail is true.”

On the decision of the four players to step down, Hamidin said: “We didn’t receive any notice from any of them. If they want to quit the national team, so be it. But they must do so in the correct manner.

“I only just managed to contact Safiq about the matter and will get in touch with JDT as well.”

Kim Swee also attended the press conference and was visibly upset by allegations the players were revolting against his training methods and the lack of intensity of training during the trip to Oceania.

Hamidin said: “Not one player has complained about training but we will speak to them … maybe some are not satisfied. Anyway, we are evaluating Kim Swee’s and national Under-22 coach Frank Bernhardt’s training methods in our next meeting on Aug 10.

Kim Swee echoed Hamidin’s statement and said: “As far as I’m concerned, my relationship with the players is very good.

“We had National Sports Institute officers with us during the trip. I have reports, heart rates and video clips on each training session.”

He added he was disappointed by the quartet’s decision to quit but said “life has to go on” and that “the door is open” if they wanted to return to the team.

Kim Swee said they were monitoring the M-League and Malaysia Cup matches to see if they could find suitable replacements.

Meanwhile, FAM announced the national team will play three friendlies before the AFF Cup from Nov 17 to Dec.

The three matches are against Indonesia in Surabaya (Sept 6), Singapore at their National Stadium (Oct 7) and Afghanistan at Shah Alam Stadium (Oct 11).