KUALA LUMPUR – A total of 27 teams have confirmed their participation in the Under 16 (U-16) National Hockey Championship scheduled to begin this Wednesday till June 25 at the Bukit Jalil National Hockey Stadium.
Thirteen states are sending teams for the men’s category, except for Kedah, while the women’s competition will witness 14 state teams competing.
Malaysian Hockey Confederation (MHC) competition committee chairman Datuk Seri Dr Anil Jeet Singh said the confederation has spent around RM600,000 to organise the championship.
“MHC will cover this championship because we want to develop future players for Malaysian hockey and help other states to develop their U-16 teams for future Malaysian Games (Sukma) competition.
“For the Sabah dan Sarawak teams, MHC supports around 80 per cent of their flight tickets, apart from food expenses that we cover entirely, For now, we are still discussing about the prize money,” he said at a media conference here today.
He added that all teams will register on Tuesday and be housed at the Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN) dormitory.
Anil Jeet said the selection of the National Hockey Stadium as the championship venue was because it had existing world-class facilities, and provided a chance for junior players to expereince playing in the stadium as motivation.
“The national squad plays here, so we want them (the U-16 squads) to get the same feel. We also want to see talents from other states, like Sabah, Sarawak, Perlis and Kelantan who don’t have many opportunities but they have great talented players,” he said.
He also said that MHC was in discussions to determine the date of the Malaysian Junior Hockey League and the Tun Abdul Razak Cup.
