Having attended a few football matches at the new National Stadium, I found that the atmosphere there is nothing like that in our old stadium, and even bringing in old arch-rivals Liverpool and Manchester United for the Castlewood Group Battle of the Reds match did not improve it.

The new stadium has tried to liven up the atmosphere at matches by making use of its state-of-the-art features, such as having live "fan cams" and playing music over its sound system.

The playing of music during live football matches, though, is a bad move.

Where have you seen, or heard, stadiums playing music during football matches? Not in the major European leagues (the fans just sing throughout) and definitely not in the football leagues in our region.

I was at the World Cup in Brazil last year, and even then, I do not recall music being played while footballers were chasing the ball on the pitch.

The music does not add to the atmosphere; in fact, it does the opposite.

At one point during the Battle of the Reds match, Liverpool's famed anthem You'll Never Walk Alone was played, and just when some fans were about to sing along, it was abruptly cut off and replaced with a Star Wars tune.

Being a Liverpool fan, I love singing the club's anthem, but only a few lines of it were played at random moments and then cut off. How would we feel if our National Anthem were played the same way?

Perhaps we should consider if the footballers were distracted by the continual change in audio tracks.

It just went on and on, random tracks being played for a few seconds at the strangest moments - when players were passing the ball around, when the crowd was trying to start a song, or when a player fell flat on the ground.

Music should be played only when play is not ongoing, that is, before and after a match and during half-time.

Chong Chun Lian (Ms)