GOOD OUTING: The state junior players who performed well in the recent 25th Malaysia Milo Hopes Table Tennis Championship in Kangar, Perlis posing for a group photo with team manager, HelenaWee (standing at third left), their coaches and official.
KUCHING: Sarawak junior paddlers continued to shine at the recent 25th Malaysia Milo Hopes Table Tennis Championship in Kangar, Perlis.
They bagged four gold, three silver and five bronze medals to finish second behind Selangor who won seven gold, two silver and two bronze.
Sarawak’s gold came from Joel Chen Yu Chen in the Boys Under 10 singles, Derrick Tsai Chang Fung and Gabriel Ling Kerk Yu in the Boys Under 13 doubles, Boys Under 10 Team and Girls Under 13 Team.
Gabriel Ling also won the silver in the Boys Under 13 singles while the other two silvers were from the Boys Under 13 team and Girls Under 10 doubles through Tay Lynn Jia and Chong Chuing.
Apart from that 12 of state’s junior paddlers also finished among the top 10 players rankings and they are namely Gabriel Ling (second), Derrick Tsai (sixth) and Wong Zhan Huan (ninth) in the Boys Under 13; Joel Chen (first), Louis Chung (fifth) and Alan Teo (ninth) in the Boys Under 10.
Tay Lynn Jia was ranked fifth while Karen Lynn Dick was 10th in the Girls Under 10 while Alice Chang was ranked fifth in the Girls Under 13, Foo Wui Jia fourth, Catherine Chan Zhe Yen fifth and Andrea Tan sixth.
“I am quite happy with the performance of our players and it was a better performance when compared to last year where we won two golds, three silvers and four bronzes,” said team manager Helena Wee who is also one of the coaches.
The other coaches were Chua Chiaw Lian, Yip Pau Cheng, Chai Kiang Peng, Chua Yeo Fong and Liu GuanQun.
According to Helena, Sarawak had performed well in the Under 10 since it was included in the annual meet in 2004 and the Under 13 category which was introduced earlier.
“Since 2004, we have produced champions in the Under 10 such as Wendy Lau, Clement Sim, Gabriel Ling and Joel Chen,” she said.
However, for the higher national age group competitions such as Under 18 and Under 15, it was always a tough battle to compete with players especially from Selangor who are well trained and with better training facilities and expertise.
“As the players reach this age, they spend more time on tuition and preparing for their PMR and SPM examinations and less time on training,” added Helena, who lamented that the parents are more academic orientated.
Furthermore, there are more training centres in the Peninsula especially in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur which are set up by former state and national players.