Selangor HA League attracts 20

THE Selangor Hockey League (SHL) will see 20 teams battle for honours from Tuesday at the Tun Razak Stadium in Kuala Lumpur.
The curtain raiser will feature 2009 Overall Champions and Division 1 runners-up Royal Malay Regiment (RMR) against UiTM, the Overall runners-up and Division 1 Cham pions at 8.30pm.
The SHL will offer a total prize money of RM12,400 which is an increase of almost 15% from last season.
Organizing Chairman P. Kuganeson said: “The SHL will build on the success of the league last year, as not only are we offering a higher prize money for Division 1 we have also increased the total prize money for Division 2 and awards for the top 4 in Division 2.”
Despite of having a few teams drop out as the matches are being held at the Tun Razak and University Islam An tarabangsa pitches, the SHL will record six new teams.
Teams making their debut are KGT-Puchong, Woksyop Elite, Ubique, Selangor Bar Committee, SM Gombak Setia and SMK Taman Keramat.
“The Organizing and Technical Committee has endorsed for the top four teams from Division two to be automatically promoted into Division One next year. “We are also tightening the rules of the competition based on lessons learned from the previous years. Selangor Hockey Association will be the first state in Malaysia to have fully fledged Code of Conduct signed not only by Team Managers but every players and officials,” said Kuganeson
SHA deputy president Datuk Subahan Kamal said that the Association is committed towards running the Selangor league, even if it means hosting it in Kuala Lumpur.
“We are trying to save both the artificial pitches in Selangor. We have approached and written in to the relevant bodies to save the Pandamaran Hockey Stadium, which is in in dire need of refurbishing, cleaning and stitching, while the MBPJ hockey stadium needs to be re-turfed.”
For further information on fixtures, visit www.sha.com.my.