The national badminton squad that will be representing Malaysia to play in the Badminton Asia Team Championship (BATC) in Hyderabad, India next month, will have to prove themselves worthy of the selection and are expected present their absolute best performance.
The team, comprising of mostly junior players, will be handed the responsibility to maintain the nation’s pride in the sport as they are also burdened with the task of qualifying for the Kunshan Thomas Cup this May.
A part of the winning team in the 1992 Thomas Cup, Foo Kok Keong hopes that the junior players selected will be able to display an excellent form of game play alongside showing their utmost determination to triumph.
Albeit that, he also claimed that the shuttlers should not only do their best to qualify for the Thomas Cup but in fact they should continue to step up their performance to strengthen the national team as there have been many talks of the younger players being weak and lacking.
“I don’t want to comment on the selection of players because that is BAM’s (Badminton Association of Malaysia) decision,” he told Utusan.
“I think that these players were selected to give them more experience and I hope that they can do their best there.”
“I hope that in the meantime, before the championship, they will train as hard as possible and not give up,” he said as quoted from Berita Harian.
“They need to know that their job is to help Malaysia qualify for the Thomas Cup and I hope to see them win in India.”
“I also hope that other championships (Malaysia Masters) will be able to build up their confidence to take part in other major tournaments.”
Included in the list for the BATC so far are youth champion Zulfadli Zulkiffli, National GP winner Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin, Soo Teck Zhi and Soong Joo Ven for men’s singles.
Surprising duo Tan Kian Meng- Low Juan Sheng, Ong Yew Sin- Teo Ee Yi and Tan Chee Tian- Tan Wee Gieen will be playing under the doubles section.
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