Malaysia Tigress coach K. Dharmaraj believes the battle for supremacy in the Women World League Round 2 will only begin in the quarterfinals stage of the event held from Jan 14-22 at the Tun Razak Hockey Stadium. All the eight teams competing here said Dharmaraj, will automatically qualify for the Jan 19 quarterfinals upon completion of their respective pool matches and the journey to the Hockey World League Semi-finals will depend on whom the Malaysians face in the last eight of the competition. “It is very important that we finish top of our group in the preliminary round,” said Dharmaraj. “This will...

The greatest psychological barrier faced by Malaysia Tigress over the years is slowly but surely chipping away and now chief coach K. Dharmaraj wants his players to start believing in themselves in the face of bigger challenges ahead. Dharmaraj wants his charges to step into forward mode beginning with the five-match test series between the world No 21 Malaysia Tigress and Olympic bronze medallist and world No 5 New Zealand from Dec 12-18 in Stratford, located in north island, with the same kind of passion produced in the 4th Women Asian Champions Trophy in Singapore two weeks ago. “Believe in yourselves. That’s...