Malaysia Will Still Need Chong Wei For 2018 Thomas Cup - Minister

BALIK PULAU (Penang, Malaysia), May 23 (Bernama) -- Malaysia will still need badminton ace Lee Chong Wei for the Thomas Cup in 2018, said Youth and Sports Minister, Khairy Jamaluddin. He said the plan for national badminton squad was towards preparing for a new junior team but the services of Chong Wei was still required. "Even though Chong Wei has announced the 2016 Thomas Cup will be his last, I am confident and believe he could still be a formidable player come 2018. "At 34 or 35 years, Chong Wei may be fielded as the third singles, as a tactical move for the country in the 2018 Thomas Cup tournament," he told reporters here Sunday. Nonetheless, he said all plans would depend on Chong Wei, even though Malaysia would be seeing an end to the badminton players of that generation. He said this was because the current Thomas cup was the last for several national players such Chong Wei Feng, Koo Kien Keat and Tan Boon Heong. "The badminton squad will going through a generational shift and based on the present squad, I can still see Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin and the pair of Goh V Shem-Tan Wee Kiong playing in future," he said. In this regard, Khairy said the performance of Malaysia in the Thomas cup was considered good as the country achieved the target of qualifying for the semi-finals but it was disappointed that Malaysia lost to Denmark after leading 2-0. "We should admit that Denmark who fielded their second team in the championship are equally strong. However, we did chalk up several inspiring wins in two early matches including beating third seeded South Korea. "For me, the achievements were good as the national squad was not even among the four seeded teams in the Thomas Cup this time," he added. --BERNAMA