National coaching director Wong Choong Hann, who oversaw the return of 35 national shuttlers to the Academy Badminton Malaysia for the first time since the coronavirus lockdown on Tuesday, said plans are in the pipeline for a much awaited tournament to happen.
“We are still looking at the Thomas & Uber Cup as one of our prime events, and we are channeling all our efforts to prepare the players for that. To prepare them for that, we have plans to create an internal tournament.
“We have yet to set the date, we’ll need to have a discussion with the coaches first. We have time to build up the players’ momentum before tournaments begin again. As for the format, we are looking at either a team or individual event,” Wong told Stadium Astro.
Malaysia are following in the path of the Badminton Association of Indonesia, who staged an internal meet from July 1-3 that was telecasted live and saw the participation of top shuttlers including mixed doubles duo Praveen Jordan-Melati Oktavianti.
While the season restart is scheduled for September, it is still subject to international travel sanctions which has not been lifted in most countries across the world.
Staging a domestic competition would also give the coaches an initial indication of the shuttlers who would represent the national team at the Thomas & Uber Cup.
For now, Wong said the national body have registered the shuttlers for the Taiwan Open (September 1-6) and Korea Open (September 3-8), which are the first two tournaments scheduled to be staged.
“We are putting plans for the first tier tournaments, because at this point we aren’t sure which one might be cancelled at the last minute,” he said.
