KUALA LUMPUR - Three divers are in contention to fill the void left by the former world champion, Cheong Jun Hoong in the women’s 10 metre (m) individual platform after she was dropped from the national squad recently.
Malaysia Swimming (MS) secretary-general Mae Chen said they are Nur Dhabitah Sabri and the two promising young Sarawakian divers - Kimberly Bong Qian Ping and Elisha Rania Abrial Rajagopal.
So far we have got Kimberly and Elisha, as well as Dhabitah, who are intrigued to try the platform event in the future,” she said when contacted.
Mae said this following a report that MS and National Sports Council (NSC) had reached a collective decision not to renew Jun Hoong’s contract next year.
Nur Dhabitah, who often competes in the 3m springboard, is no stranger to the platform event as she and seasoned diver, Leong Mun Yee, took home the bronze medal in the synchronised event at the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia.
Kimberly, on the other hand, represented Malaysia in the event at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia, where she finished 10th overall in the final apart from winning bronze in the 2016 FINA Diving Grand Prix, also in Australia.
As for Elisha, she partnered with Kimberly in the 2016 Malaysia Games (Sukma) in Sarawak and earned gold medal in the platform event.
Mae explained a series of disappointing results from Jun Hoong ever since she last won the medal for the country in the women’s 10m synchronised platform with the diving queen, Pandelela Rinong in the 2018 Commonwealth Games led both MS and NSC to drop her from the squad.
“She has not been giving us the results. Not only that, age is another factor because Jun Hoong will turn 32 next year. She still have a lot of injuries and could not even attend a full training,” she added.
As such, it was hard to justify giving the Ipoh-born athlete the contract and keeping her in the national squad while the rest of divers were having a full training at the National Aquatics Centre, Bukit Jalil, here, every day.
Apart from Jun Hoong, Mun Yee was also excluded from the squad as reports state that the veteran diver wants to retire next year.
In the meantime, Mae informed that they will try everything they can to give the opportunity for 18 swimmers who failed to retain their place in the full-time training next year.
This, she said, provides them with a chance to train in Bukit Jalil as most of the swimmers have the potential to compete in next year’s SEA Games in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Recently, NSC decided to set achievements at top tournaments since 2019 as the Key Performance Indicator (KPI) for athletes to remain in the NSC-run training programme in 2022.
The move by NSC came after facing the reality that there will be no specific provision to continue with the Podium Programme after the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympic Games.
It thus deduced that only 288 truly eligible athletes would be retained for full-time training programmes ahead of next year’s three major games, namely the Hanoi SEA Games in Vietnam; Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, United Kingdom; and the Asian Games and Asian Para Games in Hangzhou, China. - Bernama, December 24, 2021
