Loss to Kuwait sees Malaysia stay in Group III

THE national squad will remain in Davis Cup Asia-Oceania Group III next year after some mixed performances in the tournament, which ended in Singapore yesterday.

The young team finished sixth after going down 2-1 to Kuwait in a classification tie.

Naufal Siddiq Kamaruzzaman delivered the opening point with a straightforward 6-2, 6-2 win over Essa Qabazard at the OCBC Arena.

Shamirul Shahril Adam Das showed strong fighting spirit but eventually succumbed to Abdullah Maqdes 6-1, 4-6, 6-2 in the second rubber.

Abdullah-Mohammad Ghareeb maintained their cool to deliver the winning point for Kuwait with a 6-3, 6-4 win over ShamirulSyed Agil Syed Naguib.

Christian Didier Chin, the country’s top singles player, struggled with a shoulder injury during the tournament but did play in the group stage.

The national squad defeated Iran 3-0 but lost 2-1 to both Qatar and Syria which saw them finish third in Pool B.

Christian said it was a decent result considering the circumstances.

“We could have qualified for the promotional playoff if some of the results in the earlier games went our way,” said Christian.

“I was struggling with a shoulder injury which was caused by my recent change to a singlehanded backhand.

“My body is still adapting to it and I just could not serve very hard.

“In some games, I even used under-armed serves but still managed to win.

“But I guess that is tennis. “Overall, I am quite happy because we are still a very young team and we certainly learnt a lot here.”

Shamirul and Christian are both 19 while Naufal is a year younger. Syed Agil, 25, is the most senior player in the squad.

Vietnam, who defeated Syria 20 in the promotional playoff, will move up to Group II next year.