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42 ~PORT

ARTISTICGYMNASTICSTarget: No target'announcedAchievement: 3gold, 2 silver,1bronze

Farah Ann Abdul Hadi continuedwhere she left off at the SingaporeGames, contributing another twogold like she did two years ago._Tan lng Yueh could have also de-livered two gold had she not beendemoted to silver in the vault disci-pline after a protest from competingteams. 'It would be nice to see these twohighly experienced gymnasts rnak-ing the breakthrough at the much,tougher Asian Garnes.level,

RHYTHMICGYMNASTICS

",- Target: 6 goldAchievement:a gold, ;) silverMalaysia's rhyth-

mic gymnasts were peerless atKL2017, sweeping all eight gold med-als on offer at the sport with minimalfuss.Koi Sie Yan was the standout gym-nast for Malaysia, winning four gold

r; - and two silver.It is important that the squad con-tinue to maintain -their performance

.. at the 2019 Philippines Sea Gamesand prove that they are capable ofdelivering the goods both at homeand abroad.

ARCHERYTarget: 4 goldAchievement:5 gold,3 silver, 2 bronzeWith a haul of fivegold, three' silver

and two bronze medals, the nation-al archers equalled the tally theyachieved in 2015 as the compoundand recurve archers won three andtwo gold medals respectively.Of greater significance is the resur-gence of the women recurve archers,who w'on the team event for -theirfirst gold medal in 12years.Malaysia's strength in depth is evi-dent in the fact that four of the goldmedals came in team events thoughthe archers can consider themselvesunlucky to have lost in three otherfinals.

ATHLETICSTarget: 6 goldAchievement:8 gold, 8 silver,9bronzeWith their bestperformance since

1999, athletics bounced back froman all-time low of three gold medals

~ in 2015 to win eight gold, eight silverand nine bronze.Khairul Hafiz Jantan blazed his wayto 100m glory as the national ath-letes broke six national records andthree Sea Games records.Credit for the emergence of a newand young brigade of athletes goesto the Kita Juara initiative of theNational Sports Council, with young-

_ sters such as Grace Wong, Yap SeanYee, Elena Goh and Irfan Shamshud-din set to propel the sport forward.

TIMESPORT'S SEAGAMESMany sports pass with flying colours while 'a few fall flat -

BADMINTONTarget: 2 gold

..........:rn""'" Achievement: 1gold,, 5 silver, 2 bronze

Malaysia will have to'go back to the draw-ing board as things

are not looking good for the nationalteam.'At the Sea Games, Malaysia players,especially those who reached the fi-nals, failed to capitalise when it mat-tered most. With the Thomas Cup,Asian and Commonwealth Gameslooming, it will be interesting to seehow BAM president Datuk Seri NorzaZakaria and his coaches turn things

around. '

BASKETBALLTarget: 1goldA~hievement: 1goldThe national wom-en's team, under

coach Yoong Sze Yuin, bulldozedtheir way to a winning 6-0 record'to retain the gold medal they won inSingapore two years ago.As the men laboured to yet anotherfifth-place finish, the women's teamprovided the cheer for the fans at theMaba Stadium. The Malaysian Bas-ketball Association, however, have tofind a way to get the struggling men'steam to perform after missing out onthe semi-finals yet again following adefeat by Thailand.

BILLIARDSANDSNOOKERTarget: 1gold

[~:::;iiI.Achievement:3bronze

Expectations were high on RoryThorChuan Leong and Moh Keen Hoo toretain their singles and doubles goldmedals, but they succumbed to pres-sure in their own backyard. 'It was the first time Malaysia did notwin a gold medal in the Sea Gamessince the 2009 Korat edition.Cue sports' are not highly regardedand as a result, they receive limitedfl1riding for exposure. Furthermore,there is no training centre to developthe sport. '

BOXINGTarget: 1goldAchievement: 1gold,1silver, 1bronzeMuch to the delight ofthe Malaysian Boxing

Federation, the team met their targetthrough Muhamad Fuad Mohd Red-zuan (men's light flyweight). Howev-er, powerhouses like the Philippineshave cried foul over dubious judging.

, In truth, Malaysian boxers still havea long way to go before they could be

on par with countries like Thailand orthe Phillipines. A good achievement,nevertheless.

BOWLINGTarget: 4 goldAchievement: 7 gold,4 silver, 3 bronze

• You can always count onbowling to deliver when

it matters. Rafiq Ismail and ShalinZulkifli were the top performersas they won three titles each in themen's and women's competitions.For the women, it was a sweet outingas they overcame rivals Singapore,who brought in eight coaches for theSea Games. Bowling will now shifttheir focus to next year's Indonesia

Asian Games.

CRICKEJTarget: 2 goldAchievement: 1gold,1silver, 1bronzeCricket made a success-

ful Sea Games debut with Malaysia,Singapore and Thailand sharing thethree gold medals on offer. However,the national team will be disappoint-ed to have allowed Singapore to takethe men's Twenty20 gold medal aftermaking an atrocious start to the final.The Malaysian Cricket Associationhad targeted two gold medals, includ-ing the 50-overs title which Malaysiawon, and will now have to work hardin negotiations with the Philippinesto ensure cricket remains on the pro-gramme in 2019.

CYCLING(Road, trackandBMX)Target: U-goldAchievements: '

. Track: 13gold, 10 silver,3bronze

Road: Two gold, 3 silver, 1bronzeBMX:1bronzeCycling, in all three disciplines; ex-ceeded their targets as all track, roadand BMX athletes played their partto add to the 145-gold haul but therewere ups arid downs along the way.The ups was Fatehah Mustapa com~ ,ing out as the most profitable winnerin cycling as she entered with a tall or-der of participating in four differentcategories (women's keirin, women'ssprint, women's team sprint andwomen's time trial 500m), anq shedelivered in all four.Azizulhasni Awang provided cyclingwith its great moment when he de-livered the nation's Hlth gold (themen's sprint), the targeted milestoneneeded for Malaysia to emerge as theGames overall championsThe downside was Mohd HarrifSaleh's setback in the men's road race

when he failed to defend his title after

, DIVING, Target: 13goldAchievement: 13gold,5 silver,1bronze

OLYMPIANS, world champion multi-ple Sea Games champions made upthe diving squad and it was no won-der that Malaysia made a clean sweepof 13 gold on offer. Amazingly, theoldest diver stole the limelight and.it looks like 32 year-old Leong MunYee will still be around for the Philip-pines Sea Games in two years time.MunYee took her Games gold medalhaul to 17 and is now thethird mostsuccessful Malaysian athlete behindbowler Shalin Zulkifli (20) and swim- .,mer Nurul Huda Abdullah (22).

EQUESTRIANANDPOLOTarget: 3 goldMedals won: 6 gold, 3silver, 1bronzeThe equestrian team

were in fine form at KL2017, comfort-able exceeding the 2 gold target withsome stunning performances, thanksto some bigname appearances.Siblings Qabil Ambak and Quzan-dria Nur Mahamad Fathil's return tothe squad made a significant impact,with them playing a hand in securingthree gold for the team.Terengganu ruler Sultan Mizan Zain-al Abidin was also in his element inthe individual endurance event whileSports Minister Khairy Jamaluddinlived up to the pre-games hype as heled the polo squad toa successful de-fence of the polo gold.",..

~~FIELDHOCKEYTarget: 2 goldAchievement: 2 gold

~ The Malaysian men'sand women's hockey

teamS have no rivals among theirAsean neighbours.Our men are ranked 12th while thewomen 22nd in the w<?rld and theyeasily aid their hands on the prom-ised golds. The women have reachedthe World League Semifinals stage,, while the men have qualified for the2018 World Cup. The other Aseancountries have poor facilities and lagfar behind...,'";.a'tfl~

FOOTBALLTarget:,2 bronzeAchievement: 1silver~.".cl

j''-t .•:: Ong Kim Swee's side- defied, the odds, by

reaching the final only to lose throughgoalkeeper Haziq Nadzli's blunder in

, the 1-0 defeat to Thailand.The team had limited preparationdue to time constraint while KimSwee had to deal with tired playersprior to the Sea Games. Forward N.-Thanabalan was the star with fourgoals.There was no progress in the worn- 'en's team as they finished last by los-ing to champions Vietnam, Thailand,Myanmar and the Philippines.

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INDOORHOCKEYTarget: 2 goldAchievement: 1gold,1bronzeThe first proper indoor

court was laid at the Malaysia Inter-national Trade & Exhibition Centre(MITEC) and the men's and women'steams only trained for five months 'there but still managed to dazzle.The men won gold and the wom~nbronze. In comparison, Thailand-andIndonesia have been actively playingthe sport for the last five years.However, the sport is set to be placedon the backburner again, as nobodyknows what to do with the artificialcarpet once it's ripped off to tu~nMITEC into an exhibition centreagain. National Sports Council dire~-tor general Datuk' Shapawi Ahmadsaid he will look for another hall, butadmitted there is none available atthe moment .

ICEHOCKEYTarget: No target setAchievement: 1bronzeAs the sport was con-tested for the first time

ever at the Sea Games, the nationalmen's ice hockey team did not expectmuch.Malaysia won their opening matchagainst Indonesia (10-3) but subse- 'quently lost against Thailand (4-10).They won the bronze after the 8-2 vic-tory over Singapore. The MalaysianIce Hockey Federation aim to' keep, working on developing new talents.

_ rr--" JUDO~ Target: 2 silver' , "~_~_ -~ Medals won: 1silv!,!r,I._.J/It!tp - 2 bronze":;" ~\ Malaysia's judokas have

not won a Sea Gamefgold in 36 years a'iid it was not reali§-: ._,tically expected to happen at KL2017.Chong Wei Fu did well to deliver asilver as Mohd, Farhan Uzair Fikriand Nor Izzatul Fazlia Tahir, both ex-pected to challenge for gold, falteredat the semi-final stage.The sport will need to expand at thegrassroots to beable to progress. '

KARATETarget: 7 goldAchievement: 7 gold,2 silver, 4 bronzeKARATEKAS deliveredseven gold in two con-

secutive games to be among the suc-cessful teams. The fighting was in-tense in kumite and the pattern wasmesmerising in the kata as Malaysiawere well prepared. 'And with instant video referral avail-able for coaches to protest on pointsawarded, there was no issue of biasjudging at the kuala Lumpur Conven-,tion Centre.

, FRIDA Y,SEPTEMBER l,2017 •NewStraitsTimes

SPORT 43

However, Vietnam were also impres-:sive and walked away with a haul of5-3-6, and Malaysia must be wary oftheir advancement in the sport.

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LAWNBOWLSTarget: 4 goldAchievement:7 gold, 1silverThe lawn bowlers

showed they have no peers in theregion on the way to sweeping sevenout of eight gold medals and exceed- 'ing their four-gold target.But a side that included formerworld champion Safuan Said missedout on the men's, fours gold to thePhilippines, _The performances are a good signfor the Commonwealth Games nextyear where the relative youth of theMalaysian squad should augur well.

MUAYTarget: -2goldAchievement: 2 gold,1silver, 1bronzeThe Muay squadproved their two gold

haul at the 2013 Myanmar Gameswas no fluke as they matched thatperformance with almost a com-pletely new set of fighters.Ain Kamarrudin and Mohd .AliYaakub lived up to expectations asthey both stuck gold in their classes.Muay was not included at the 2015Singapore games.

NETBALLTarget: 1goldAchievement:IgoldThe national worn-

, en's netball squadcame into the Sea Games with onemission and one mission only - thatis to take toe gold medal from 2015hosts, Singapore and they did ex-actlythat. 'In the pr.eliminaries, Malaysia wonfour of four matches for a cleansheet to only meet old-time rivals

_"" Singapore in the final and 'eventuallywinning 65-41. ,Well led by captain Nur SyafazliyanaMohd Ali, the team saw exceptionalperformances from Nur Fariha Ab-dul Razak, An Najwa Azizan and No-rashikin Kamal Zaman. '

OPEN WATER 'Target: 1goldAchievement:2goldKevin Yeap andHeidi Gan ex-

ceeded the target by winning a goldmedal each in the men's and wom-en's lOkm open water race.It was a great ending to their careersas Kevin and Heidi announced theirretirements after their events. Ma-laysia must now look for new talentsto fill their,shoes.

PENCAK SILATTarget: 8 goldAchievement: 10 gold,2 silver, 4 bronzeBest ever performance,from the pencak silat

squad as they bagged three gold'from the seni and seven from theolahraga events.

Mohd AI, Jufferi Jamari won his"fourth consecutive Sea Games goldsince 2011. At 25, the three-timeworld champion still has his bestyears ahead of him.He will be the nation's main hope forgold when the sport makes its debutat the Indonesia Asia Games nextyear.

rp""" RUGBY7s~C' A Targets: One silver'-....:.::5- (men's), third place

(women'), ... Achievements: One

. gold (men) and onebronze (women).Following a great year for Malaysianrugby, the -team routed Singaporeto winthe rugby 7s Sea Games gold.This was after upsetting 2015 cham-pions Philippines.In the women's competition, Malay-sia's second attempt at rugby 7s inthe Sea Games produced exactlywhat they were hoping for, a bet-ter result than fourth place in 2015,when they won -the bronze medalfollowing a narrow 7-5 win over the

.Phm:~.e~l)" ~::~!~:G5g0Id

, Achievement:6 gold, 4 silver,4bronzeThe Malaysian

sailors won six gold from 14 events toexceed their target byone though itwas down from the seven gold won.in 2015, when 20 events were staged.Four of the gold medals came in .age-restricted optimist and Internation-al420 events which point to a brightfuture for Malaysian sailing.The challenge now is for the sportto translate regional success intocontinental level at the Asian Gamesnext year where Malaysia have a goldmedal to defend.

• A~_~ ~.Jl SEPAK,TAKRAW

~~~, ,~~, Target:2goldAchievement:

El C"a_ 2 gold, 3 silver,6bronze

'- As expected, thenational team had no problemsachieving their' two-gold targetthrough the inter:'regu and chinlonelinking even~s as arch rivals Thai-land did not compete in both.Th'esquad were, however, disap-pointing in the men's team eventwhere they los't, to Indonesia in theround robin competition and wereforced to settle for bronze. ,The Sepak Takraw Association ofMalaysia and the sports ministryhave said the true test for the teamwill be at the Asian Games in Indone-sia next year. Judging from their per-formance at KL2017, there remainsmuch work to be done.

SHOOTING '~ ~ ) Target: 2 gold

.<",~ Achievement:4 gold, 5 silver,3bronzeJonathan Wong cre-

ated a stir by overcoming an Olympicchampion for the men's 10m air riflegold medal as shooting surpassedtheir target at the'Subang Shooting

Range.Other gold medallists were Benja-min Khor (men's double trap), EzuanNasir Khan (men's 50m rifle prone) ,and Alia Sazana Azahari .Iwomen's25m pistol). .The achievement is a sign of pro-gress but the National Shooting As-sociation of Malaysia (NSAM) mustlook into the poor performance ofthe women's rifle team who wereonce .the country's top medal win-

SKATINGSpeed Skating andFigure SkatingTarget: 3 goldMedals Won: 5 gold, '3 bronze

The Ice Skating Association of Ma-laysia (ISAM)'s target was exceededby two gold medals when Anja Chongdelivered three gold in the women'sindividual500m, 1000m and 3000mteam relay.Julian Yee also contributed withgold in men's figure skating while themen's 3,000m relay of Mohd AriffRasydan, De-Vin Wong, Khairil Rid-hwan Khalil and Hazim Shahrum fin-ished on top of the podium.The figure and speed skaters willnow focus on qualifying for the 2018Winter Olympics as well as becom-ing the nation's first-ever represent-atives in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

SQUASHTarget: 7 goldAchievement: 6 gold,4 silver, 2 bronzeThe sport's best-evermedal haul of six gold,

four silver and two bronze was tern- .pered by the loss Of the men's teamevent to unheralded the Philippinesin the semi-finals:The national coaches underesti-mated the opposition in choosing aweakened line-up and paid the ulti-mate price as squash fell short of itsseven-gold target.However, in deciding to field a squadof youngster for the Sea Games, theSquash Racquets AssociationofMa-laysia should be lauded for placingtheir trust in juniors, as shown by'the women's team who won gold witha side exclusively made up ofteenag-

SWIMMING• Target: 3 goldAchievement:

~~~ 3 gold, 3 silv~r, '3bronze

Welson Sim was the star with twogold medals in the men's freestylewhile Phee Jing En kept her prom-ise by retaining the women's 100mbreaststroke title as the JosephSchooling-led Singapore dominatedthe pool.The 'team mJlY have achieved their,target, but it does not augur wellfor Malaysia as national cpach Paul'Birmingham depended on the sameswimmers that won him titles at the2015' Singapore edition.The other swimmers failed tp rise tothe occasion in their own backyard.

SYNCHRONISEDSWIMMINGTarget: 2 gold

Achieve-ment: 2 gold,

'~~~j(t;a~~'3 silver~ Gan Hua Weiand ZylaneLee were the

stars for Malaysia, but Singaporedid better by winning three of thefive events. Other members of thenational team could not raise theirperformances due to lack of experi-ence.The national synchronised swim-mers hardly compete overseas,while Singapore have been invest-ing in top coaches to guide their-'team. More must be done by theAmateur Swimming Union of Ma-laysia to develop this,sport.

TABLE TENNISTarget: 3 bronzeAchievement:2 bronzeTable tennis ended

on a slightly disappointing note forthe Malaysian contingent as someof the players, namely, veteran Ng ~Sock Khim failed to make it past thequalifying stage .Sock Khim had initially targeted abronze but it did not materialise.The paddler will have one more last'chance (next year's CommonwealthGames) to make it count before call-ing it quits next year.

Target: 1bronzeAchievement:

\ r Ii ..- 1bronze, 't' Jawairiah Noor-

..... din and S. Theiviyaended Malaysia's 14-year medaldrought in a non-team event by win-ning the women's doubles 'bronzemedal.In the other events, Malaysian play-ers failed to make any impact, los-ing in the early rounds. Malaysia will,have to wait for another two yearsto end the country's 44-year goldmedal wait in the sport.

TRIATHLONTarget: 1goldAchievement: 1bronzeIrene Chong's bronze medal in the'women's triathlon was all the sportCQuid manage after, Rikigoro Shino-zuka won silver in the men's eventtwo years ago in Singapore.The Philippines proved too strongfor the rest of the competition asthey won gold and silver and boththe men's and women's races.The Malaysians struggled in Putra-jaya but with the exception of Irene,have youth on their side and witha little more experience and expo-sure, could return to ,challenge fqrmedals at the next edition in thePhilippines.

VOLLEYBALLTarget: 1bronzeAchievement: NilVolleyball was the only sport thatdid not deliver a medal for the Ma-

lays ian contingent.In fact, both themen's and women'steams did not evenreach the' semi-finals. 'Malaysia's best re-

sult was winning a silver .at the 2001,edition, but have not come any-where close since. 'Malaysia Volleyball Associationclaimed there are not enough tour-'namehts in the, country and it'shard sourcing for players. Some-thing must be done about it.

WATER POLOTarget: No targetAchievement:1bronze

,_ The men's waterpool team defied the odds by win-ning the bronze following wins overthe Philippines and Thailand,whilethe women's team failed to finish onthe podium.It was the first podium finish for themen's team since the 2005 Manilaedition. The water polo fraternityhope more funding will be chan-neled to the sport after the success.

WATERSKII 'Target: 2 goldAchievement:4 gold, 1silver,

;:> 2 bronze• . --" Once again, +

the Hanifah Yoong clan reigned su-preme in the sport, exceeding thetwo gold target.The nation's waterskii darling Aali- ,yah Yoong bagged three gold whileher brother Adam became theyoungest athlete at the KL2017 towin gold in the trick event.The focus now is to increase the poolof athletes, so that more Malaysianscan be as good as the Yoong skiiers.

WEIGHTLIFTINGTarget: 1silver,2 bronzeAchievement: ,

":H'cljiiNorL",=-- 1silver, 1bronzeIt has neverbeen easy for

national lifters at the Sea' Gamesand it was no different this time asthe squad found it tough againsttheir Olympic-class opponents.Mohamad Fazrul Azrie Mohdad, 22,however, snatched a surprise silverin the men's 85kg class. Along withLoro Wellkinson Peuji, the sportdoes have potential that can be de-veloped. '

WUSHUTarget. 6 gold 'Achievement: 6gqld,5 silver,3 bronzeLoh Jack Chang and

Yeap Wai Kin Were the top perform-ers with two gold medals each intheir respective events. Unlike theprevious editions, there were nobiasjudging as top officials from theInternational Wushu Federation,were called in to oversee the com-petition.It was a $.uccessful event as Malay-sia emulated the six gold medalsthey won in the 2QOl KL edition.

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