KUALA LUMPUR – Diving queen Datuk Pandelela Rinong hopes national aquatics governing body Malaysia Swimming (MS) will work on increasing the country’s talent pool of divers.
Despite her sadness about the current situation in diving, the 2016 Rio Olympics silver medallist acknowledged that the Covid-19 pandemic had also taken a toll on the development of junior athletes in the national team as well as among state divers.
However, the Sarawakian is still hopeful that the country will produce good divers in the future, provided all relevant parties, including MS and the National Sports Council (NSC), put on a more concerted effort to unearth new talents.
“There is a chance (to produce good divers), we just need time to develop (them). To go from the junior (level) to my level is not easy; it needs time.
“I hope the relevant parties, like MS, have plans to increase the talent pool. NSC’s efforts are also important because I came from their development programme, so I hope it can be continued,” she said when met at the launching of her “P.Zero 1” NFT here today.
The media had recently reported that several events in athletics and diving would be dropped from the 20th Malaysia Games due to the lack of state participation.
NSC then issued a statement saying that the cancellations were unavoidable because the affected events failed to secure the participation of at least six states.
The games are scheduled to be held from September 16-24.
On a separate note, Pandelela, who will resume training tomorrow after the recent Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games, said that she would compete in the Kuala Lumpur Diving Grand Prix in November. – Bernama, August 24, 2022
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