Veteran Pandelela gets rookie partner for World Championships
KUALA LUMPUR: The new combination of veteran diver Pandelela Rinong and Sea Games champion Lee Yiat Qing will carry Malaysia's hopes in the women's 10m synchronised platform at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore from July 11-Aug 3.
Two-time Olympic medallist Pandelela seems to have made a full recovery from a tricep muscle injury at the World Cup in Canada in April.
Malaysia Aquatics (MAS) diving technical director Yeoh Ken Nee said they expect the Podium Programme athletes to reach the finals and the back-up athletes to gain experience and build momentum for the Thailand Sea Games in December.
"Our hopes were on Pandelela before and now too in the 10m synchronised platform. She will be having a new partner who is a first timer competing in the World Championships. Yiat Qing has won gold in the Sea Games, they are our hopes," said Ken Nee in a press conference at the National Aquatic Centre today.
"We want at least a big tournament (World Championships) for them to feel the pressure. So when they go to Sea Games, at least the level and pressure is slightly lower."
Malaysia will also be sending five male divers to the world meet, with the target of reaching at least the final in every event.
Enrique Harold Maccartney and Elvis Priestly will compete in the men's 10m platform synchro while Syafiq Puteh will feature in the springboard events.
Two young divers, Nurqayyum Nazmi Nazim and Yong Rui Jie, have also been named for the springboard events, though the final selection for the 1m and 3m events has yet to be confirmed.
Meanwhile MAS announced that its president Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim, deputy president Marilyn Chua, vice president Anthony Ang Kang Keam and assistant secretary Nurul Huda Abdullah, have retained their posts unopposed ahead of the national association's AGM on June 28.
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