23-04-2025
Malaysia Rugby to conduct post-mortem after ARC relegation
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia Rugby (MR) will conduct a post-mortem to understand the reasons behind Malaysia's heavy defeat to Sri Lanka in the Asia Rugby Championship (ARC) relegation-cum-promotional playoff last week.
The Bunga Raya squad succumbed to a 59-19 defeat in Colombo and have thus been relegated to ARC Division One (second tier) which will only be played next season.
MR president Amir Amri Mohamad said the national body is determined to look ahead and rebuild for the future.
"We expect to conduct a post-mortem soon and identify areas we need to improve on," said Amir when contacted today (April 23).
"The last few years have been challenging and our priority now is to fix any issues we have and look to improve.
"We acknowledge the past, however, we do not want to dwell on it. The goal is to look to the future and rebuild.
"This will, however, take time and I hope everyone will remain patient."
Malaysian rugby was hit hard during the Covid-19 pandemic as restrictions did not allow for any contact sports to be played for almost two years in Malaysia.
The national body was then hit with an embezzlement case in 2022, incurring losses of over RM2 million.
Malaysia had won its two previous encounters with Sri Lanka in 2016 (42-17) and 2017 (22-9), the latter securing promotion to the ARC top-tier for 2018.
The heavy defeat to them last week thus sparked concern within the rugby fraternity with former national 15s head coach Wan Ibrahim Wan Chik stating that MR must look to swiftly correct issues from the ground up.
