KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian women's hockey team aim to discard their "fifth in Asia" tag by gatecrashing the Hangzhou Asian Games semi-finals.
Coach Nasihin Nubli's angels are in Group A with Hong Kong, Singapore, India and South Korea. In Group B are champions Japan, China, Indonesia, Kazakhstan and Thailand.
"In our group, it's wajib (mandatory) to beat Hong Kong and Singapore but India are way out of our league.
"That is why our target is South Korea. We have no choice but to aim for the sky against Korea if we want to play in the semi-finals and discard our No 5 tag," said Nasihin.
While the Malaysian women rule at Sea Games level, their best finish in the Asian Games was bronze in the 1982 edition in New Delhi and fourth at the 1986 Seoul Games.
After that, it has always been fifth in Asia as India, China, Japan and South Korea took turns to win medals by consistently playing in the semi-finals.
Meanwhile, the Indonesian and Singapore teams are in Malaysia to play a series of friendlies, but not with the national team. Singapore will play against Selangor while Indonesia will meet the Tunku Mahkota Ismail Sports School.
"Indonesia and Singapore are playing and training in Malaysia right now, but we will not have any sessions with them as we have our own programme to follow," said Nasihin.
The men's and women's teams will be named next week, with 18 players in each squad to carry the nation's flag at the Asian Games.
Going by early indications, striker Hanis Nadiah Onn will be back in action after serving her suspension for making insensitive comments on social media. The other seniors in the Asian Games squad are expected to be skipper Juliani Mat Din, Nuraini Abdul Rashid and Fatin Shafika Sukri. Nasihin is expected to select 14 juniors for Hangzhou.