PUTRAJAYA: Datuk Seri Subahan Kamal hopes to see the national hockey teams reach new heights during his third and final term (2023-2027) as president of the Malaysian Hockey Confederation (MHC).
Subahan returned unopposed when nominations closed on Nov 14, securing 13 nominations ahead of today's annual general meeting here.
"Overall, I wouldn't say our hockey teams, especially the men's senior squad, performed poorly in the last eight years, they were just inconsistent," said Subahan,
"MHC will persist in providing players with top-notch coaches, training and overseas exposure to facilitate improvement.
"Our men's team were unlucky not to qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics via the 2018 Indonesia Asian Games. This year, we narrowly missed a World Cup quarter-final spot, losing to Spain, and things did not go as planned at the Hangzhou Asian Games when we lost to South Korea in the group stage."
The amended MHC constitution limits the top post to three terms.
"Consistency is our bane. We are addressing this problem, and hopefully, everything will align well for the Olympic qualifier in Oman (on Jan 15-21)," said Subahan.
Meanwhile, former vice-president Datuk Najmi Razak won the deputy president's post unopposed, replacing Jadadish Chandra.
Datin Mary Saadiah won the women's deputy post unopposed after serving the last term as vice-president.
Rogayah Mohamed (11) and Zaillah Tahir (4) won the women's vice-president positions uncontested.
MHC's 16 affiliates — 14 states as well as Police and the Armed Forces — voted to select five men's vice presidents.
Penang HA president Ranjit Singh withdrew his nomination for the vice-president's post, while K. Gobinathan of Negri Sembilan only received six votes.
The five elected men's vice-presidents are Shurizan Mansor (26), S. Ganesan (26), Sayuti Abdul Samat (25), Hasnizam Hassab (23) and Datuk Anil Jeet Singh (15).
Perak HA president Sayuti and his Selangor HA counterpart Ganesan are newcomers, while the rest are incumbents.