Kuching players and officials celebrate their 14th straight victory in the Sarawak Table Tennis Championship after the prize presentation.
KUCHING: Defending champion Kuching romped to their 14th straight victory in the 54th Sarawak PMG Table Tennis Championship at SMK Tinggi, Sarikei recently after capturing 12 gold, eight silver and 14 bronze medals.
They were dominant in the team competition where they swept six out of the eight team titles, winning in the Men’s Open, Women’s Open, Boys Youth, Girls Youth, Boys Hopes and Girls Hopes.
In the individual events, Kuching bagged the Men’s Open singles through Chai Kian Beng, Boys U18 singles (Rayford Kho Jin Hian), Boys U13 singles (Christopher Goh Kho Hian Hui), Girls U13 singles (Elicia Tsai Xin Ni), Veteran Men singles 45-54 years old (Ting Ing Hock).
The other gold medal was contributed by the brothers pair of Chai Kian Beng and Chai Kiang Peng in the Men’s Open doubles.
Kuching’s silver medals were won by Chai Kiang Ann (Men’s Open singles), Alice Chang Li Sian (Women’s Open singles), Andy Jong Ngu Suai (Boys U18 singles), Kylie Teo Liyi (Girls U18 singles), Alan Teo Jie (Boys U13 singles), Tay Lynn Jia (Girls U13 singles) and Benjamin Thian Khang Chenn (Boys U10 singles).
The bronze medals came from the Non-Chinese Team, Men’s Open singles (Chai Kiang Peng and Clement Sim Kwong Zhi), Women’s Open singles (Andrea Tan Ruen Yuen and Kylie Teo Liyi), Boys U18 singles (Jason Siaw Ting Shen and Clement Sim Kwong Zhi), Boys U15 singles (Derrick Tsai Chang Fong, Girls U15 singles (Elicia Tsai), Boys U13 singles (Alfred Ting Wei Hong), Girls U10 singles (Tan Chung Yi), Men’s Open doubles (Clement SIm/Derrick Tsai) and Women’s Open doubles (Alice Chang/Andrea Tan).
“We are happy that we can retain the overall champions title again for the 14th consecutive year and kudos to all the team members for their good performance and hard work,” said team manager cum coach Helena Christine Wee.
She said there is much room for improvement especially in the girls singles events where only Elicia Tsai won a gold medal.
“We had also targeted to win the Boys U15 singles and Boys U10 singles golds through Derrick Tsai and Benjamin Thian but they failed to live up to expectations.
“However, we managed to win the Women’s Open team and Men’s Veteran (45-54 years old) events and we could have won more gold medals if Kueh Wan May and Matthew Aloysious were in the team,” she added.