HONG KONG, July 1 (Xinhua) -- The newly assigned headcoach of the badminton team of Hong Kong, China said on Thursday that an Olympic medal is always the goal which they would do all the best to achieve in the London Games 2012.
He Yiming, on his duty as the formal head coach of the Hong Kong team for the first day on Thursday, told Xinhua that he would continue the effort of the former head coach to strive for a first ever Olympic badminton medal for Hong Kong and hopefully it would come true in London.
"We have a few promising young players who just entered their 20s," said He. "I am confident that they would be able to reach a high level in a couple of years."
The 48-year-old He, a former Chinese national player, assumed the deputy head coach of the Hong Kong team when Chan Chi Choi retired in April after leading the team for 15 years, and was formally appointed to be the successor on June 22.
Under the leadership of Chan, the Hong Kong team was promoted from the third division in the Sudirman Cup mixed team championships to the top group, and wrapped the women's singles gold and silver medals in the Asian Games in 2006.
"Uncle Choi retired with no regrets but an Olympic medal," said He, who had been the coach of the women's singles in the team for more than 16 years. "Now it's our turn to make it happen."
The main hope of the medal would still come from the women's singles. Wang Chen, the former world's No.1 and the Asian Games champion in 2006, had replaced He Yiming as the women's singles coach in April.
