Only two athletes have qualified for Youth Games

KUALA LUMPUR: Only two athletes have thus far qualified for the Youth Olympics, which will be held in Singapore from Aug14-26.
Both of them are from sailing – Mohamed Amirul Shafiq Mohd Jais and Khairunneeta Mohd Afendy. They duo earned places in the inaugural Games from the Youth Asian Games, which were also held in Singapore last July.
The Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) secretary general, Datuk Sieh Kok Chi, said yesterday that they expected to have a contingent of at least 15 athletes.

“At the moment, two sailors have made the cut. The respective international federations organise qualifying tournaments and we will only get to know the status of an athletes once they inform us of the results,” he said.
“I have reminded all our NSAs (national sports associations) to monitor the qualifying meets for their sports and to let us know who have qualified on merit.”
Kok Chi added that there was still time for more athletes to qualify as the deadline for the entries was in April.
“For example, we do not know the status of the badminton, archery, swimming, shooting and athletics events. But I am confident that we will have qualifiers in these sports,” he said.
“Of course there is limit on the number of athletes per sports but this will not affect us unduly in the individual events,” he added.
Kok Chi added that the OCM hoped the NSAs would take the Youth Olympics seriously.
“They have to ensure that we do not miss out on any qualifiers. This is an opportunity for our juniors to compete against the best in the world and also where the future stars could be groomed,” he said. STAR

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