Utusan Online. BAM to monitor men's doubles KOTA BHARU Oct 4 - The Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) has expressed concern over the performance of the men's doubles players which was inconsistent in several international tournaments recently. Its president, Datuk Nadzmi Mohd Saleh, said here Friday that the BAM was monitoring the development of the players before deciding whether to keep or drop them for next year. BAM was worried over their current standards and achievements but would still give them a chance to improve, he said. "We have to look at their development in the next few months." Nadzmi said there were a few under-studies who could take up the mantle of the national doubles players if BAM decided to drop certain core players in the current squad for poor performance. He said Malaysia's status in future international tournaments could not be forecast as the country did not have many lower echelon players, unlike other countries like China and Indonesia. This occurred because parents did not encourage their children to take up sports, he said. Another major weakness, Nadzmi said, was that Malaysians loved to idolise and excessively praise teams or individuals who won at the international level only to turn around and criticise them if they failed. This attitude, he said, placed extra stress on the players to perform. Nadzmi also suggested an incentive scheme be introduced for sports officials and not only for athletes in sports.
I think they should seriously look at both the singles and doubles players. And also not forgetting the womens if they want the gals to have their mark in the international level.
There's one major problem with M'sian players and thats with their fighting spirits. They always started with very high fighting spirits at the begining of a game but soon changed to low or no fighting spirits after that. I have seen countless occasions where M'sian players played very well initially but after the first game, they started to give away bonus points to their opponents rather easily. They always make a lot of unforce errors later in their games and they usually will never recover from there. When I see that happen, I know the game will be over very soon because our M'sian player has given up. They could also be lack in stamina as well.
A major problem is the expectation that the newspaper reporters places on the players. They quote very unrealistic expectations (e.g. if a player comes back from injury, or a run of poor form), and the public picks up on this. Have any of those people(reporters and public alike) who are so fickle actually done sports at an elite level? Many have not - otherwise they would know how difficult it is and have a sense of perspective. By blatant public criticism, a common result is to demean the individual's image and also destroy their self-confidence. This makes the players' and coaches' tasks all the more difficult and a vicious cycle develops as has been alluded to in the above report. Anybody think otherwise?
I quite agree with Cheung there. I keep hearing "... the All England Champion..." every time they talk about Hafiz although that's just one title out of a few. Hafiz deserves the credit of course but to stretch it on and on does little to help in keeping the pressure off his shoulders to keep on winning and winning and winning. Time to move on - little good in dwelling in the past.
I do agree.. with what happened to after Msian team won the TC last time.. they went to a slump after that. We must concentrate to achieve better results rather than enjoying our success. Improvement and success is a constant thing.. we can't just stand still after thinking that we are successful. Other people will improve and they can overtake us if we don't keep on improving ourselfs.
Re: Re: NEWS: BAM to monitor men's doubles I agree. The media should play a huge "supporting" role for players, but not a source of "proof" for discouragement. Many times, reporters just dig out pieces and make up a story (their own though, etc) to draw attention. They never care about how the player / coach feeling, and sometimes, they even don't care about the truth, even they know it. It's already very tough for the players to perform well in a consistent level, unnecessary pressure from media and fans can only make things to be even worse. It's like a poor little kid trying hard to study well, and getting good grades everytime, but the strict parents just yelling at him each time he did not get 100/100.
Interesting to hear BAM president, Nadzmi said the following: "He said Malaysia's status in future international tournaments could not be forecast as the country did not have many lower echelon players, unlike other countries like China and Indonesia. This occurred because parents did not encourage their children to take up sports, he said." I agree with him 100%. When I was a high school kid back then, most of my friends played badminton but none of our parents encouraged us to do so. We played simply because we loved the sports. If I recall precisely, I was not aware of any high schools providing badminton training programs (maybe others did). With so little push from the government to promote the sports at grass root level, it amazes me Malaysia still able to produce so many talent players. Malaysia boleh !
I agree with you. Now I recall that my secondary school didn't even have a badminton court. We have to book a court from other school elsewhere. I find that they are many people like to play badminton but somehow M'sia just didn't do enough at all to promote them.
Malaysian players always seem to face that mix of overhyped success with over the top criticism. This is similar to what happens in England, not just with badminton but with football especially. The world cup comes round and for months England are put up as one of the favourites etc even though they only have a couple of world class players, then when the national team loses a barrage of criticism. Look at the All England winner Hafiz, as wilfred says, his success was overhyped. He played well for one week, had a good draw, and his opponent had a tough draw to the final. Great win but don't then criticise him for not winning every week. Malaysia never has been a Korea, China, Indonesia or even Denmark, in recent years they have had odd successes, the Thomas Cup, Cheah/Yap, accept that you are chasing those big four and be grateful for the success you do have!
