SEA Games Report Card: Juniors Did Good

Hit and miss. National Sports Council's director-general Zolkples Embong was full of praise for national back-up athletes who did well at the Myanmar SEA Games which ended on Sunday, and critical of some sports that failed to live up to expectations. - Filepic

NAYPYITAW: The Malaysian young guns have proved their worth at the Myanmar SEA Games.

Out of a total haul of 43-38-77, a total of nine golds, four silvers and 12 bronzes came from the national back-up team.

And that is good news for Malaysia, who are searching for new stars to make a stronger assault at the Asian and Olympic Games.

“This is the highest-ever gold medal contribution by the back-up athletes in our SEA Games history, And it does not include the young athletes who are already in the elite squad,” said a proud NSC director-general Datuk Zolkples Embong.

The men’s back-up athletes who won golds are Lim Chee Wei (men’s kata individual), the men’s kata team (Chee Wei, Leong Tze Wai and Emmanuel Leong Theng Keong), Eddy Chew (shooting), Sentil Kumaran Selvarajoo (men’s kumite’s below 60kg), Mohd Irfan Shamsuddin (discus) and Nauraj Singh Randhawa (high jump).

Gole medallists S. Shree Sharmini (kumite below 68kg), pencak silat’s Nor Hamizah Abu Hassan and Nur Syazreen Abdul Malik (ganda double) and wushu’s Phoon Eyin are from the women’s back-up squad.

For the 18-year-old Irfan, the NSC have big plans for him.

“He is one of our outstanding athletes here and we will continue to give him the right exposure. He is our star for the future,” said Zolkples.

Of the country’s multiple gold medallists, Zolkples was full of praise for Mohd Jironi Riduan for winning golds in the 800m and 1,500m.

“This is Jironi’s last SEA Games and he showed great determination and pushed himself hard to the finish line. He will now become our coach at the Bandar Penawar Sports School.”

Zolkples, however, was disappointed with four sports – football, sepaktakraw, archery (compound) and cycling (road).

“We invested so much on sepaktakraw and they could not even nick one out of the 18 gold medals. These sports need to review their performances,” said Zolkples.

Other assessments by NSC

• A total of 13 sports were given excellent billing for winning gold medals – swimming (4), diving (8), badminton (1), billiards and snooker (1), bodybuilding (1), equestrian (3), hockey (2), karate (7), shooting (1), muay (2), sailing (2), wushu (3), archery recurve (2).
• Five sports – cycling, football, archery compound, athletics and pencak silat – failed to meet the gold medal target.
• Six sports – equestrian, badminton, karate, muay, swimming, billiards and snooker – delivered more than they promised.
• Six national records were set through Mohd Irfan Shamsuddin (men’s discus), Jackie Wong Siew Cheer (men’s hammer), Mohd Hakimi Ismail (men’s triple jump), Iskandar Alwi (men’s pole vault), men’s 4x200m freestyle (Lim Ching Hwang, Kevin Yeap, Daniel Bego and Welson Sim) and Nor Khasida Abdul Halim (women’s weightlifting, 69kg).