THANKS to Covid-19, Malaysia don't have to fight to qualify for hockey's Junior World Cup (JWC) in India from Nov 24-Dec 5.
This came after the Asian Hockey Federation (AHF) decided to cancel the Junior Asia Cup — men and women in Japan and Bangladesh which would have acted as qualifiers — due to Covid travel restrictions.
Following the cancellations, AHF designed a quota system, which allows Malaysia, as the third ranked men team, to qualify.
Top-ranked India have qualified, along with second-placed Pakistan and fourth-ranked South Korea.
The Malaysian women are the second reserve team behind South Korea.
The top three ranked sides: China, India and Japan have booked their berths in the women's JWC.
Meanwhile, the Malaysian Hockey Confederation (MHC) hope to get the green light early from the authorities to start their national junior team training camp.
With barely four months to go before the JWC, the team need to start preparing fast, and a training tour of Europe especially in Belgium, the Olympic champions, would be ideal.
National Junior team manager I. Vikneswaran said MHC president Datuk Seri Subahan Kamal has been in discussion with the National Sports Council (NSC) on the matter.
"We understand that Covid-19 is making things difficult, but we must get the team to start training.
"|We are willing to train in any way, including doing camp-based centralised training where we will be under a bubble.
"Southeast Asia is under lockdown, so it's tough to get teams to come over for test matches.
"We are thinking of tours in either Australia or Europe because of the quality of the opponents and because they have opened up their countries."