KUALA LUMPUR, June 15 — Men’s singles and mixed team event.
Those are the events that the Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) are relying on to achieve the target set by the Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England, next month.
While the main attention would be on those events, BAM high-performance director Tim Jones is still hopeful that shuttlers from other categories could still deliver at least a silver in Birmingham.
“So, we will need to perform at our best level to achieve the target,” he told Bernama when contacted today.
Recently, BAM doubles coaching director Rexy Mainaky said they intend to bring only the best to Birmingham.
Malaysia will surely count on men’s singles ace, Lee Zii Jia to deliver one of those targeted gold in the singles category.
Zii Jia can also lead the charge for Malaysia to wrest the gold medal from reigning champion, India in the mixed team event.
Apart from Zii Jia, the national team should be able to count on 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games men's doubles bronze medallists Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik and world number 10 women’s doubles pair of Pearly Tan - M. Thinaah to mount a strong challenge.
Yesterday, OCM president Tan Sri Mohamad Norza Zakaria announced that the seven-gold-medal target, and if met would match the country’s achievement at the last edition in Gold Coast, Australia.
Badminton is hoped to contribute two gold medals, while gymnastics, lawn bowls, weightlifting, squash and powerlifting are expected to chip in with one gold each.
The 2022 Commonwealth Games are scheduled to be held from July 28 to August 8.
— Bernama
