KUCHING: More high-level match officials are needed to help run International Tennis Federation (ITF) sanctioned tournaments in Malaysia.Lawn Tennis Association of Malaysia (LTAM) technical committee chairman Patrick Liew said the present number of officials was not enough to cover the increasing international tournaments being played in the country.

“We now have only three white badge officials – Alexis Wan, Rozaman Wok and Joe Ibrahim – for ITF world junior tournaments … so there is an urgent need to train up more such officials,” he said yesterday.

Liew, who is also Sarawak Lawn Tennis Association president, said LTAM was looking to upgrade Wan to a bronze badge official to enable him to officiate in professional tournaments such as the Kuching US$10,000 ITF Women’s Circuit being held here this week. A white badge official is qualified to officiate in an ITF world junior tournament while a bronze badge official is qualified to officiate in a professional event. “For the ITF Women’s Circuit, we had to ‘import’ a bronze badge official, Puneet Gupta, from India at about US$1,800, including airfare, accommodation and fees,” he said.

Liew said supporting officials such as chair umpires and linesmen must be well qualified.

As such, he will organise at least one refresher course (for experienced officials) and two Level One and one Level Two officiating courses next year.

According to him, LTAM is planning to organise nine Futures (professional circuit) events with a prize money of US$15,000, two ITF Women’s Circuit events with a prize money of US$10,000 and the ATP 250 Series with prize money of US$1 million next year.

He noted that the level of tennis in the country had been on the rise as many juniors like Jawairiah Noordin, Sia Yew Ming, Adam Jaya and Sarawak’s Razlan Rawi had started playing professional tennis.

“Jawairiah has been playing in 25 professional circuit tournaments with funds from Majlis Sukan Negara.”

Liew said organising professional tournaments in the country would give the juniors a chance to play at a higher level.

“Those players no longer eligible for Sukma can now play in the professional tournaments,” he added.