Sannatasah steps forward ready to fill the void

IN the absence of Julia Wong, youngster Sannatasah Saniru has been thrown the gauntlet to add depth in the Malaysian women’s singles department.

And the Sabahan is ready to take a giant leap to become a better player.

“I have been asked by the coach to train harder to fill up the gap left by Julia. I am ready to go the extra mile,” said Sannatasah.

“I will get to compete in more international tournaments if I continue to show marked improvement in my game. There is a chance for me to move up and I do not want to waste this opportunity.”

Malaysia are now without Julia, who needs a long break to recover from surgery on a knee injury suffered at the Sudirman Cup world mixed team championships in Guangzhou in May.

In her absence, the current top two female shuttlers are Wong Mew Choo and Lydia Cheah.

But Malaysia need at least four good singles players to mount a decent challenge in the Uber Cup Finals in Kuala Lumpur next year.

Besides Sannatasah, who emerged as the Pahang Open runner-up, the others being groomed to make it big are Tee Jing Yee, Stephanie Shalini Sukumaran, Ooi Swee Wern, Florah Ng and Ng Sin Zou.

“With Julia out, I am the fourth ranked player. The back-up player ahead of me is Jing Yee. Hopefully, all of us will do well to add more strength in the women’s singles department,”said Sannatasah.

Yesterday, Sannatasah was one of the four Malaysians to march into the second round of the Malaysian Open Grand Prix Gold tournament. The others who made it were Mew Choo, Lydia and Stephanie.

Sannatasah defeated Japanese Chie Umezu 21-16, 15-21, 21-16 to set up a match against fifth seed Juliane Schenk of Germany. Mew Choo will have a second-round match against Stephanie.

Lydia had to go the distance for a 16-21, 21-16, 21-18 win over Thailand’s Sapsiree Taerattanachai and will play against Singapore’s Fu Mingtian today.

The top two seeds, Pi Hongyan of France and Saina Nehwal of India, cruised into the second round.

Posted by Lucas Liau on 5:12 PM. Filed under News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0