KUALA LUMPUR, April 25 — The 2017 Sea Games champions Malaysia will take part in 51 of the 56 sports events to be contested in the 2019 edition in the Philippines in November.
For the record, this is the largest number of sports events being contested in the biennial Games.
The announcement was made by Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) president Datuk Seri Mohamad Norza Zakaria after chairing the selection committee meeting today.
Mohamad Norza said the decision was made after identifying the sports with medal prospects, especially the gold.
“We must determine that for the sports we are participating in, there are further development programmes (for them) because we do not want to just send (a squad) and then later, they no longer want to continue with the sport.
“In addition, we made the decision to compete in 51 sports only after rejecting sports which in terms of relevance, we saw would have no impact on the Malaysian contingent,” he said.
The five sports Malaysia will not be contesting in are handball, arnis, kurash, sambo and wrestling, which are listed in Category B.
Meanwhile, he explained that 12 of the 51 sports were included after OCM received appeals submitted by non-affiliated associations.
The 12 sports are e-sports, floorball, ice skating, jujitsu, kickboxing, modern pentathlon, obstacle course, skateboarding, soft tennis, surfing, triathlon and underwater hockey.
At the same time, Mohamad Norza said OCM was still evaluating the types of sports to be placed under Category A and B, and that it would be decided after the assessment period which ends in June.
“We will evaluate based on the athletes’ best performances in the last 12 months to see whether they are eligible for Category A or Category B,” he said. — Bernama
