Seu Bock wants to toughen up women’s singles players

KUALA LUMPUR: National women’s singles head coach Tey Seu Bock plans to toughen up his shuttlers.

Youngster Goh Jin Wei and Soniia Cheah saved Malaysia the blushes at the Kuala Lumpur SEA Games when they made it a 1-2 finish in women’s singles.

But Seu Bock is not satisfied, saying “a change in the mind set of the players is needed”.

“Jin Wei and Soniia’s 1-2 finish is a good sign for Malaysia’s women singles. But we still have a lot of work to do,” said Seu Bock.

Jin Wei and Soniia have improved under the guidance of national coach Rony Agustinus while the others in the team are slowly making progress.

“As the head coach, I need to change the mentality of the players and instil a sense of self-belief in them. All of them must believe that they can be a world-class player and not limit themselves,” said Seu Bock.

The others in the national team are Lee Ying Ying, Ho Yen Mei, Lim Yin Fun. S. Kisona and M. Thinaah, Yap Yee and Lee Zii Yii.

“At the recent World Championships (in Glasgow), Nozomi Okuhara of Japan defeated P.V. Sindhu of India in a very physical women’s singles final. The standard of play was high,” said Seu Bock.

“Our players can be like them. Nozomi and Sindhu are not super humans but they trained hard to be where they are now. Our players can be like that too but they must adopt a positive mind set.”

Seu Bock said that some of the singles players held back their punches during training for fear of injury.

“I don’t care about injuries. Constant injury shows that one’s body is not strong. They must develop physical strength and it comes with diligence during training sessions,” he said.

“Some of them are too soft and need to be pushed.”

Seu Bock’s goal now is to add depth to the team ahead of the Uber Cup Finals in Bangkok from May 20-27.