SEPANG: Malaysian Hockey Confederation (MHC) technical director Terry Walsh slammed his critics who are demanding for his resignation following the national team’s failure to achieve their target at the World Cup in Bhubaneswar, India.
Instead, the Australian will continue with his job and focus on assisting the national coaches to build a solid team for next year’s Olympic qualifiers.
The 65-year-old said his critics are those who do not possess the coaching credentials in hockey
“I do not have a problem with my critics. They probably do not understand what we are really trying to do.
“It takes a long process to build a solid team,” said Walsh when met at the KLIA here on Sunday.
However, Walsh admitted that he was disappointed with the national team’s performance in Bhubaneswar.
The team earned only one point against Pakistan (1-1), and suffered defeats to the Netherlands (7-0) and Germany (5-3) to finish bottom of their group.
“The players did not perform to their best ability, so we failed to achieve good results,” said Walsh.
Several officials and former internationals want Walsh to resign as they feel he has not done much in uplifting the standard of the game in the country.
Meanwhile, national coach Roelant Oltmans is confident that his team will bounce back in next year’s Olympic qualifiers.
“The team lost their playing pattern after conceding the third goal against the Netherlands in their opening match. They were mentally affected and could not play well.
“However, the players performed better against Pakistan and Germany but could not recover (from the thrashing by the Dutch).
“We were unlucky not to score more than a goal against Pakistan. If we had won, we would have qualified for the playoffs and probably finish in the top-10 bracket.
“The next move is to take the experiences from the World Cup and work on them in training to prepare for next year,” said the Dutchman, who will scout for more players in the Malaysia Hockey League, which starts in January.
Oltmans needs to find new blood as some of the current ones in the national team are reaching their retirement age.
Malaysia will start next year’s international calendar with the annual Sultan Azlan Shah Cup in March, followed by the World Series, which is part of the Olympic qualifying process, the following month in Kuala Lumpur.
Malaysia will go against Austria, Canada, Italy, Wales, Vanuatu, China and Brazil in the world series.
The team must secure a top-two finish to advance to the final phase of the qualifiers — two playoff matches in October and November to confirm their berth to Tokyo.