Richard Song Swee Jin
KUCHING: The Sarawak Rugby Union (SRU) is relieved that the state Sukma men’s and women’s teams can get back to normal training soon.
This sentiment was relayed by its president Richard Song Swee Jin who hailed the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) announcement that sports and recreational activities can resume on June 17.
“I believe it’s about time that we get down to business and start building momentum again.
“This is because for players in contact sports like rugby, the longer you delay preparations, the weaker they become even though you give them a training programme,” he told The Borneo Post.
As the players are not professional and national players, the association is eager for them to train together more often and brush up their skills and game sense.
“With this Covid-19 still fresh in some of the parents’ minds, it is hard to get approval too. If the minister has given the green light let’s take advantage of his words and get down to it.
“Yes, leave the contact part for the time being and focus on reshuffling our periodisation plan and make it to our advantage.
“Let’s start working on the players fitness and we can still keep our safety distance, working on our strength in the gym,” Song said.
He is expecting the coaches to spend more time with individual player on one-on-one skills specialisation on various positions, mapping out plans on how to play each team, looking at strengths and weaknesses of opponents and working things to Sarawak’s advantage.
“For the time being, we don’t know when we going to really play the game to get the feel of it but one thing we can do better now is walking through the calls and moves and familiarise everything now before we go 100 per cent come December just nice to get few local games and head to Sukma Johor next year,” he added.
He revealed that both management and coaches are doing all they can to keep the players in shape but what is lacking is the togetherness as the rugby players can’t wait to get the feel of that oval ball again.
According to Song, training had started at the stadium on Saturday, with a few boys working on their core skills using gloves.
Nevertheless, he advised caution with the resumption of training and stressed that Standard Operating Procedures guidelines from the Ministry of Youth and Sports must be strictly followed.
“We do not want any of the players or the squad to fall ill during training. We understand that being a contact sport there are always risk involved.
“The only setback is that there will be no tournaments for which the team can participate,” he said.