Major reforms needed to upgrade RI sports
JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia has suffered a major sports setback and needs to radically change its national development programs following its miserable showing at the just concluded Asian Games in Hiroshima, a track legend says.
"Many national sports prime movers did not properly rate national athletes' quality before sending them to the Asian Games," Mohammad Sarengat, the Games 100m record setter in 1962, said yesterday.
He charged the prime movers with not telling the truth about their athletes' performances during the centralized training sessions in order to allow them to join the national team.
"They should have known to withdraw their athletes from such a big sports event," he was quoted by Antara news agency as saying.
The national sports body (KONI) picked athletes for the team based on reports from all the sports organizations.
He added that performances during tryouts do not accurately serve as the true yardstick of an athlete's ability. "The prime movers have to learn whom their athletes compete with in a proving-ground tournament," Sarengat said.
Indonesia's medal haul fell seventh to 11th at the Asiad, the worst performance in 32 years. The 142 member national team won a paltry three gold medals to go with 12 silvers and 11 bronzes, slightly up from Beijing four years ago when Indonesia garnered three golds, two silvers and 13 bronzes.
All of Indonesia's gold medals came in badminton, the sport the country has completely dominated the past two years. South Korea, in fact, eclipsed the badminton powerhouse with a haul of four golds, thanks to the shocking semifinal loss of prohibitive favorite Susi Susanti at the hands of no-name Hisako Mizui of Japan.
Limit
Amid financial shortcomings following the cancellation of the national SDSB lottery, KONI decided to only send athletes with a realistic prospect of medalling in an attempt to limit the Indonesian contingent.
KONI, however, enlarged the team by picking athletes from eight sports in addition to those from the original 15 sports, saying that the newcomers deserved seats on the squad based on their impressive performances.
The sports body had also set targets of winning at least eight gold medals and finishing sixth. It reconsidered the target later, saying that the five former Soviet Union republics would be strong challenges to beat.
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan made their threat a reality by taking the fourth and fifth spots respectively. Indonesia trailed five other original Asian countries, including Southeast Asian neighbor Malaysia, as well.
Sarengat backed KONI's standard, saying that true winners are gold medalists. He, however, found that the sports development program adopted from Western countries failed to work as expected due to the prime movers' limited skills.
"They even failed to provide morale boosters to their athletes. Where were they when our athletes were training rigorously?" Sarengat wondered. (amd)