MHF to decide on juniors’ eligibility for MJHL today

The Malaysian Hockey Federation (MHF) competitions committee will meet today to decide whether to allow national juniors to feature in the Malaysian Junior Hockey League (MJHL), which starts next month.

The 32 national juniors’ trainees were barred from playing in the National Under-21 tournament, which ends today.

However, national juniors coach V. Muralidharan wants his charges to be released to play in the MJHL, which will begin on Feb 4.

“The Junior World Cup is only next year. There’s no point for them to continue training.

“It will be better for them to play in the MJHL as it will give them match exposure,” he said.

“Anyway, all the states will field teams in the league in preparation for the Terengganu Sukma (Malaysia Games) in June.

“And the states will definitely want their national juniors to play for them in the MJHL.”

He also said that he would propose to the competitions committee that this year’s MHJL be made an Under-20 tournament instead of Under-19.

“By raising the age limit, there will be a bigger pool of players to select from for the Junior World Cup. And those who are 20-years-old will be eligible to feature in the Junior World Cup next year,” said Muralidharan, who was appointed as the national juniors coach last month.

His first assignment will be the eight-nation tournament which will be held at the National Hockey Stadium in Bukit Jalil from Jan 17-27. The other teams are Australia, Germany, Holland, India, South Korea, Pakistan and New Zealand.

In preparation for the tournament, the national juniors will play seven friendly matches with the New South Wales juniors.

The first friendly match will be at the National Hockey Stadium today.

Malaysia and Singapore will co-host the 2009 Junior World Cup, which will feature 20 teams.