BEIJING, Aug 23 (Bernama) -- Malaysia's last gasp of hope for an Olympic medal from taekwondo through Che Chew Chan fizzled out after she was first ousted in the quarterfinals and lost another opportunity in the bronze repechage.
"I was worried about too many things at a time and that perhaps added to the pressure and affected my own performance," said Chew Chan who was unable to hide her disappointment at losing 1-5 to Egypt's Noha Abd Rabo in the repechage.
"I had beaten her before in the Korea Open in 2006. But today, I could not judge the distance in making my attacks in the last two matches," said the national exponent who also scored only one point against Nina Solheim in the quarterfinals in the afternoon.
Chew Chan said there was little separating the standards of the contestants.
"It goes down to who performs better during the fight and when I got the chance to go into the repechage, it was like God giving me a second chance," she said.
Her defeat closes the chapter on Malaysia's outing in the Beijing Games with one silver to show from shuttler Lee Chong Wei.
In the morning, the 25-year-old Chew Chan beat Uzbekistan's Evgeniya Karimova 5-4 to become the first national exponent to advance into the Olympics last eight at the Beijing University of Science and Technology.
But in her next bout, the Malaysian could not land any of her kicks.
Although Solheim tumbled five times to the ground, she made good from the few opportunities she came close to the Malaysian.
"I tried to attack her head but also missed. I misjudged the distance and whenever I kicked, she kicked back. I did my best but I am not satisfied because I tried and lost," Chew Chan said.
National coach R.Dhanaraj said Chew Chan's biggest mistake was not following on her attacks.
Malaysia's other taekwondo challenger, Elaine Teo also lost in bronze repechage in the below 57kg category.
Malaysia have been participating in the Olympics taekwondo competition since it was introduced in the 2000 Sydney Games but have yet to get a rostrum finish.
When the Korean martial art was a demonstration sports, M. Vasugi and Hii King Hung returned with bronze medals from the 1988 Seoul and 1992 Barcelona Games respectively.
-- BERNAMA
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