BAM revert to employing singles and doubles head coach

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KUALA LUMPUR: It’s back to two heads are better than one for Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM).

In yet another restructuring of the coaching set-up since the last one in May last year, BAM have reverted to having two heads – one for singles and one for doubles in a bid to revive the dwindling fortunes of the national team.

Coaching director Wong Choong Hann, who previously managed five head coaches, will now only lead the singles department while his deputy Rexy Mainaky has been promoted to oversee the doubles as the second coaching director.

Both Choong Hann and Rexy will be monitored by Datuk Kenny Goh as the coaching and training (CNT) committee chairman.

The latest change takes place just two weeks after Malaysia returned home without a champion from the World Championships in Huelva, Spain, while Singapore won their first through Loh Kean Yew.

This year, Lee Zii Jia won the All-England while Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik clinched bronze at the Tokyo Olympics.

These feats were seen as simply not good enough especially when even Singapore have now produced a world champion and fans are running out of patience.

It is not the first time that BAM had used such structure.

Kenny: ‘How I wish I have a magic wand to make things work right away.’

In 2002, Indonesian Indra Gunawan headed the singles department while South Korean Park Joo-bong assumed the doubles chief coach role.

The structure was disbanded and revived over the years with Rashid Sidek and Rexy named as national singles and doubles chief coaches in 2010.

Kenny admitted that there was no guarantee that the changes would work this time either.

“There’s only a few structures to work with no matter how we turn it around,” said Kenny in a press conference after chairing the CNT meeting yesterday.

“Of course, there’s no guarantee. How I wish I have a magic wand to make things work right away.

“Things could get worse if we don’t make a change. We don’t change for the sake of changing. This was done after a thorough analysis of the national team’s recent tournament results.

“The structure aims to address the weaknesses within the team, lack of game plan, inconsistencies, too many levels of coaching structure, lack of focus in the training sessions and lack of mental toughness.

“We believe that by streamlining the structure that we had previously, it will take our shuttlers to a greater level and ultimately achieve our objectives.”

Kenny was not shy to sum up the shuttlers’ overall performance in 2021 as “could have been better” despite launching their Project 2024 three years ago.

“We have big challenges ahead of us next year where we have the Hangzhou 2022 (Asian Games), Birmingham 2022 (Commonwealth Games), Vietnam SEA Games (in Hanoi),” said Kenny.

“And one of our major milestones in the Project 2024 is obviously the Thomas Cup. We want to do as well as possible, hopefully reaching the final.”