KUALA LUMPUR: The national women’s basketball team will need to show more fighting spirit if they hope to retain their Sea Games gold medal in the Philippines on Nov 30-Dec 11.
This was the opinion of head coach Yoong Sze Yuin after watching her charges fall to a meek defeat to Taiwanese outfit Chunghwa Telecom at the Maba International Invitation at Maba Stadium here today.
Despite a promising first half, the team collapsed after the break as they got squashed in a 58-77 defeat.
With the early shooting prowess of Yap Fook Yee and the experience of Eugene Ting and R. Kalaimathi, the team kept pace with Chunghwa — a regular mainstay in the Taiwanese Women’s Super Basketball League (WSBL) in the first two quarters.
However, Chunghwa changed up their game after the break, forcing the Malaysian women into numerous turnovers.
That proved to be their downfall as the national team simply couldn’t find a way back into the game.
Chunghwa’s Wen Chi emerged the top scorer with 24 points while hulking centre Hsieh Pei-chon finished with a double-double of 14 points and 14 rebounds.
For Malaysia, Fook Yee led the way with 16 points and Kalaimathi contributed eight points and 15 rebounds.
Sze Yuin is, however, more displeased with the way her team gave up far too easily on transition defence.
“Today we lost because we had too many turnovers and our defence communication was sorely lacking,” said Sze Yuin.
“But I’m really not happy at the way my players just lacked urgency and fighting spirit. They gave up on defence just far too easily after committing turnovers.
“This is definitely a wake-up call for the team. Chunghwa are a quality team and this defeat will let them know where they stand and where they need to improve.”
The Malaysian women so far have one win and one defeat in the competition. They started on a high by thrashing Shanghai Dahua 96-38 on Wednesday.
Their last two games are against Tohoku Gakuin University of Japan tomorrow and Taiwan’s Fo Guang University on Sunday.
In the men’s competition, the national team are on a roll after beating Australia’s Wah Chin Kings and the Westports Malaysia Dragons by huge margins in their first two games.