MTA TO BANK ON LOCAL COACHES

From TheStar.com.my

KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Taekwondo Association (MTA) have decided not to renew the contract of their foreign coach, Yu Myung-wan.

The South Korean, a former champion in the World University Games, was roped in early this year to help prepare the exponents for the recent Vietnam SEA Games and also qualification to next year’s Athens Olympics.

But the national exponents did not fare well in the world qualifiers for the Olympics, which was held in Paris just before the SEA Games.

At the Games in Ho Chi Minh City, Malaysian taekwondo suffered a big blow to their pride. The saving grace was provided by Lim Yit Ming, who unexpectedly won the men’s flyweight gold medal on the final day of competition.

The MTA’s coaching chairman, Ben Wong, said that Myung-wan would leave for home soon.

“We did not do well with the input of foreign expertise. We have decided to give the local coaches full control from next year,” he said.

He added that R. Dhanaraj would remain as the chief coach and the MTA would hold a discussion with the National Sports Council (NSC) next month on plans to rope in more assistant coaches for the national team.

“We have yet to discuss with the NSC on the programmes and budget for next year. We intend to have a bigger squad and we will need more coaches,” said Ben.

The MTA coaching board also decided to drop men’s featherweight exponent Syed Taufiq from the Asian qualifiers for the Olympics, which will be held in Bangkok from Feb 15-17.

“We are not happy with his performance in the SEA Games. He was supposed to deliver a medal but lost in the early rounds,” said Ben.

Those who will shoulder the Malaysian challenge for the Asian Zone qualifiers are Yit Ming and women exponents Lee Wan Yuen (heavyweight) and Elaine Teo (bantamweight). The Asian qualifiers will be the last chance for them to win places in the Olympics. Only the top two in the respective categories will get to go to Athens.