AS the new coach of the national squash squad, Malaysian mentor Wee Wern Low has sat down with every team member to map out their goals and what they want to achieve out of the sport.
“With Philippine Squash Association president Bob Bachmann, we have been talking to each player, asking them what they want out of squash, to write down their goals. So at least we are heading in the right direction,” Low said.
“We want to know what each player wants to get out of the squad. Because not everyone has the same goals. Not everybody aspires to be a professional player. Some want to use the sport to go to college,” added the coach, who spurned college offers from the US, including Harvard, to pursue a pro career at the age of 17.
“It is important for us to sit down with them one-on-one, setting their targets and adjusting them to if they are realistic. Whether they are attainable or not. It is not just merely playing sport but to see a long-term vision for themselves,” she added. “So we are heading in the right direction.”
Raised by a single mother in the city of Penang, she disclosed that she had a clear vision of what she wanted to be “because for me squash was the only way of getting a better life. It was the only way I knew how.”
With the help of her first Malaysian coach, Aaron Souza, Low made a deal with her mom then “that if I don’t make it to the top 50 in the world in a year, I would pack my bags and gain an education. Before the year was over, I was No. 48.”
Low, who was ranked No. 5 in the world in 2014 and a two-time Asian Games silver medalist, was proud of the fact that she excelled despite not training overseas.
“My coach and I proved that we could do it here in my country when I was told repeatedly that I should go to the US or Europe to become better,” she said.
This was why she was drawn to coaching the Philippine squash squad given her own humble background.
‘Yes, there were better and higher offers, but I wanted to pay back to the sport for what it had done for me,” she said.
