New coach to boost wushu team

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia's quest to win six gold medals in the wushu competition at the upcoming Southeast Asian Games has received a major boost with the presence of former Malaysian coach Phoon Chee Kong.

Phoon had been a national coach for his country's team before he quit due to an internal rift within the Malaysian wushu body.

The Indonesian Wushu Association (WI) promptly saw the opportunity to snap up Phoon, who has been training national athletes for three months.

"But we don't use the term 'poaching'. We just saw merit in Phoon and brought him over here. We hope that his knowledge of the Malaysian team will provide worthy input for us to map the opponent's strength," Kamadi, the wushu training director, said here on Thursday.

An overall 16 athletes are currently being groomed at Semarang, Central Java and Medan, North Sumatra.

Semarang is the training ground for athletes who will compete in the sanshou fighting category. They are Alfred Maweru, Teguh Prasetowo, Christian John and Arif Haryoso. They are under the tutelage of former national boxer Sutan Rambing and Moskos Panjaitan.

Medan is home base for those who will join the taolu martial arts competition. They comprise six men and six women. The men are Herman Wijaya, Gogi Nebulana, Seno Prakoso, Matius Joko Wahyono, Sandri Liong and Suhendri.

Their female compatriots are Dewi Arimbi, Susyana, Fitri Santoso, Nurdiana, Chandra Y. Santoso and Sherly Budiono.

Phoon is one of the three foreign coaches supervising the taolu specialists, in addition to their two local colleagues.

KONI has originally set a target for the wushu team to win four golds.

Indonesia is banking its medal prospects on Alfred Maweru, Chris John, who is a professional boxer, Susyana and Nurdiana. The other two outfit members expected to increase the tally are Dewi Arimbi and Gogi Nebulana.

Kamadi rated Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines as strong contenders. (01)