Liew (centre) with Bounx system provider chief operating officer Datuk Tim Garland, on his left, as well as coaches (from left) Liew Meang, Simon Tiong and Stevie Din in a photo-call taken after the briefing on the system at SLTA Tennis Centre.
KUCHING (Jan 1): At least 42 national and international tennis competitions would be held in Malaysia throughout this year, says Lawn Tennis Association of Malaysia (LTAM) vice-president Dato Patrick Liew.
According to him, the plan is to make Malaysia a preferred destination for tennis events, especially those sanctioned by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and Asian Tennis Federation (ATF).
“The LTAM has lined up 42 events for 2023, and from the total, we have seven international events for ITF World Tennis Tour Juniors, three for ITF Women World Tennis Tour W15, eight for ATF Asian U14 Series, and five for ATF U16 Series.
“There will also be seven National Junior Tour events, and six National Circuit events,” Liew told The Borneo Post here.
The Sarawak Lawn Tennis Association (SLTA) president – also chairman of LTAM tournament, officiating, technical development and systems application, as well as head of junior development and Junior Tennis Initiative Programme – said the organising and running of the LTAM events would follow those of SLTA’s, which had proven very successful in holding of ITF competitions since 1992.
“We want to make Malaysia one of the most active (tennis) nations in Southeast Asia.
“When we bring in international events into the country, we help save costs for local players because it would cost them a lot to travel and play outside Malaysia.
“This is also part of helping to promote sports tourism and more of our players would get more international ranking points and therefore, we can expand our level of tennis and bring up our overall image of tennis to the world,” he said.
Liew added that he would love to see tennis installed as a compulsory sport in Southeast Asia (SEA) Games.
Currently, tennis is still an optional sport in the biennial regional meet.
“We have never won gold from tennis at the SEA Games – the best was a bronze medal.
“If we could secure gold, we would get more support from the government.
“By organising more international events, we could help raise the standard of our players and it would be very motivating for them to apply for scholarships in overseas universities,” he pointed out.
Liew added that the recent launch of the new ITF World Tennis Number (WTN) via Bounx system in Kuala Lumpur and Kuching should help boost the growth of the game in Malaysia, and also open doors internationally for Malaysian players.
“By using this system to register our players for local, national and international events, we are able to know the total number of players in Malaysia, as well as their ratings and rankings,” he said.