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Suresh and Khairul nominated for World Archery Awards

4 min read

11 months ago

Suresh Selvathamby. Photo World Archery

World Para Archery champion Suresh Selvathamby and Khairul Anuar Mohamad have been shortlisted for World Archery’s 2019 Athlete of the Year Awards.

Khairul has been nominated for the men’s recurve category while Suresh for the Para Men’s category.

The 25-year-old Suresh stunned the archery fraternity by bagging the world title, going into the tournament ranked just 35th in the world.

He defeated American Eric Bennet in five sets to become the world champion in the recurve men’s open category in the Netherlands. His rival, the 45-year-old Bennet, was world champion in 2015 had opened the match better and built a 3-1 lead. But that was as far as he would get – as Suresh rallied and won three consecutive sets.

By winning the gold, Suresh became Malaysia’s first ever winner at the world level in Para archery. Suresh, who hails from Kuala Ketil, Kedah lost half of his left leg in a lorry crash at the tender age of 13, forcing him to depend on a prosthetic leg.

He will be up against American Ben Thompson, Turkey’s Bahattin Hekimoglu, Ruben Vanhollebeke of Belgium and Britain’s Steve Prowse for the award.

Malaysia Paralympic Council secretary Laksamana Pertama Dato Subramaniam Raman said that it was a proud achievement for Malaysia that Suresh has been nominated for the award.

“We certainly hope that he would win the award. Nevertheless it is an honour that he has been nominated,” said Subramaniam.

A public vote will be open throughout January 2020 and the winners of the awards will be announced during the Indoor Archery World Series Finals on 8 February.

Khairul, is a two time Olympian, is currently ranked ninth in the world. His nomination is backed by the being him being a finalists at the world championships in the Netherlands last July.

He was beaten in a shoot-off by American Brady Ellison in the final.

The 27-year-old has been shooting internationally since 2011. He’s got a single individual Hyundai Archery World Cup podium to his name, back in Shanghai in 2011, but has long seemed a contender for bigger results.

He came sixth at the London 2012 Olympic Games and at the World Cup Final in 2013, lost in the second round at Rio 2016, and came close to qualifying for a second World Cup Final in 2018 – eventually finishing the season 10th in the rankings.

At the Manila SEA Games, Khairul failed to bag the gold, finishing only with a silver and bronze in the men’s team and mixed recurve events respectively.

The other nominated for the same category are Brady Ellison (USA), Lee Woo Seok (Kor), Mauro Nespoli (Ita) and Ruman Shana (Ban).

The 2019 Athlete of the Year awards for recurve men, recurve women, compound men, compound women, para men and para women will be decided by a combination of a public vote and expert panels. Awards for the coach, breakthrough archer and the new judge of the year will be chosen by expert panels.

Online voting can be done here.