NORZA GETS BACKING
C&T want him to continue as BAM president despite recent backlash
AMID heavy criticism, the BAM Coaching and Training (C&T) committee want Datuk Seri Norza Zakaria to continue helming the national body. Following a string of poor performances, Norza has come in for some flak, especially on social media, after the national team’s recent outing at the World Championships in Nanjing, in August and the Asian Games in Jakarta, — where they returned empty-handed for the first time in 32 years.
C&T chairman Datuk Ng Chin Chai, after chairing a C&T meeting at the Academy Badminton Malaysia (ABM) yesterday, said the committee take full responsibility for the national squad’s recent performance, and urge Norza to continue spearheading BAM.
“Recently, there has been a lot of adverse comments on social media about our president. Despite all that, the C&T, as a whole, fully support Datuk Seri Norza (Zakaria) to continue being our president.
“He is a good leader, and since the technical aspect of the sport lies with the C&T, we take full responsibility for the recent poor showings,” added Chin Chai.
Moving forward, the committee announced their intention to hire a coaching director, to improve the state of Malaysian badminton.
In view of the national body’s ultimate goal to win the elusive gold medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, Chin Chai said: “We had targeted to win two medals at the Asian Games, and we failed to achieve that.
“Today we got the report from the team manager as well as the four head coaches (Misbun Sidek, Paulus Firman, Pang Cheh Chang and Rosman Razak).
“Prior to that we had the World Championships, where our best performance was reaching the quarter-finals. We admit we have failed to meet what we wanted to do, and we have to plan to move forward.
“After today’s meeting, we will be preparing a post mortem, as our Sport Minister (Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman) wants a report from BAM. We will pass it to the ministry as soon as we can.
“One of the main things we want to do is hire a coaching director, who can handle the entire national squad from coaches to players on a full time basis.
“We believe having a coaching director, will improve the general training quality and there will be more focus on results at the major events.”
Pending the appointment of a new coaching director, BAM want the head coaches to review their coaching programme, stressing on discipline and results, while demanding senior players step up to the plate.
Top shuttlers, who fail to deliver podium results, could risk being dropped at the next window in December.
The major tournaments next year include the World Championships, Sea Games, Sudirman Cup and Badminton Asia Championships.
In 2015, BAM hired Denmark’s Morten Frost as technical director, but the Dane quit last year, citing personal reasons.