Malaysian sports.... there's still hope yet

The recent Malaysia's triumph in the 2010 ASEAN Football Federation Suzuki Cup in a two-leg match with Indonesia has brought a ray of hope to Malaysian sports, especially football. The Malaysian football team has been a subject of much discussion and criticism for not performing up to expectation, especially for the last two decades or so. Not to mention, the performance of our football team has been abysmally poor that even many mediocre football teams from other countries have a field day winning many matches and tournaments against the Malaysian team.

Having said this, Malaysia could actually be one of the countries in the world to be able to become a sports powerhouse. We actually have most resources in the right places and a large pool of promising talent. The only flaw to this effort of producing world class athletes is the attitude of the athletes themselves. Malaysian athletes tend to hang up their sports equipment whenever they ran into serious problems, from my observation. However, there some exceptions to this, for example, Datuk Nicol Ann David and Datuk Lee Chong Wei.

Not to say the other national athletes are not able to reach their fullest potential as a world-class athlete, they are able to do so with the opportunity and excellent resources available within their reach, however, our athletes should improve their attitude towards their trainng and pursuit to be a world-class athlete. These athletes could take a leaf out of the book of our country's own success stories in the international sporting scene.

Being a Malaysian also means I'll always be supporting Malaysian athletes competing in the international sporting scene, even though I may criticise them severely for poor performance and lack of the right attitude while in competition. These athletes should improve their attitude when they are in competition as sports is a big business; incentives aside, they should also must remember to strive for the glory of the country as well.

Gone were the days where we can take pride of Malaysia being the powerhouse of sports like badminton, hockey and football. However, all is not lost as currently the country still has athletes who are carving names for themselves and Malaysia in their respective sports in the international sporting scene. These athletes should be an example for budding and promising athletes to follow suit.