Liew presents the Sarawak Chief Minister’s Cup to girls singles champion of the 28th Sarawak Chief Minister’s Cup (II) ITF Junior Circuit (Grade 3) tennis championship Park Sohyun while (from right) tournament director Douglas Telajan, treasurer Kho Siak Koi and secretary Bernard Chin look on.
KUCHING: After hosting its final tournament of the year – the 28th Sarawak Chief Minister’s Cup (II) ITF Junior Circuit (Grade 3) tennis championship – that ended yesterday, the Sarawak Lawn Tennis Association (SLTA) will now be focusing on its junior tennis development.
“We had a successful year where we hosted seven international events and also the Sukma XVIII competition,” said SLTA president Dato Patrick Liew.
As the schools holidays are coming up, Liew said SLTA will be sending its coaches to some schools to conduct Talent Identification programmes.
“We will provide free coaching in the schools which have tennis courts and from there we will bring those interested and committed students to SLTA to continue with further development,” he said.
Liew said SLTA are stressing on junior development as it needs to build up players for Sukma competitions.
“This is essential because the number of potential Sukma players is declining due to age limitation. Players like Aslina Chua will be over aged for Perak Sukma in 2018,” he pointed out.
“The trend over the last two years is that the number of young people taking up sports especially tennis is also on the decline probably due to school commitments and tuition, busy parents unable to send their kids for training and many of the young kids spending so much time in playing Pokemon, Facebook and other social media.
“In tennis, it takes at least five to 10 years to bring up the juniors to be good Sukma players and we need a good succession plan to groom players who will be as competitive as their counterparts in other states in Sukma,” added Liew.
Meanwhile, Liew said SLTA are hoping to host the Asian Tennis Tour (ATT) event next year which offers prize money to the top finishers in the main draw.
“The Asian-only players will get US$5,000 or US$10,000 as prize money. This professional event is just about to be introduced by the Asian Tennis Federation and they are still in the mid of discussions. It is very likely that it will be organised next year,” said Liew.
According to him, the prize money would help Asian players to play in more tournaments in the Asian region in the preparation for challenges in the international tournaments.
Apart from that, SLTA will also be bidding to host the Junior Davis Cup and Junior Fed Cup as well as the World Junior Team events next year.
“We will be submitting our bids in November or early December,” he added.