Press release

London, Great Britain, August 11, 2011 - With today's final day of pool play finalizing which 16 of the 24 women's teams that started this week's Visa FIVB Beach Volleyball International, an Olympic test event that is part of the London Prepared series of special events, Malaysia's Beh Shun Thing/Luk Teck Hua leave the iconic Horse Guards Parade venue with great experiences and even greater dreams for the future.

In Thursday's opening match being played with the first rain of the tournament that started on Tuesday, Spain's Andrea Garcia Gonzalo/Alejandra Simon Marta defeated Malaysia's Shun Thing/Teck Hua, 21-17, 21-14 in a 32-minute match that give the Malaysian team an 0-3 record, eliminating from this special test event held on the historic site that will have a 15,000-seat stadium during next August's London 2012 Olympic Games.

In the previous two pool play matches, the Malaysian team fought gamingly against two veteran FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch World Tour teams, losing first to Canada's Heather Bansley/Elizabeth Maloney, 15-21, 19-21 in 36 minutes on Monday and then on Tuesday in a 30-minute match to Australia's Olympic champion Natalie Cook and her teammate Tamsin Hinchley, 13-21, 16-21.

Visa FIVB Beach Volleyball International Match Schedule
London, Great Britain | August 9-14
Olympic Test Event: Women

Exclusive interviews on FIVB Youtube Video Channel

Following their loss to Spain on Thursday morning, Malaysia's Shun Thing, 25, who lives in Sitiawan, said, "Today was a good opportunity for me to win but I didn't play well. We're disappointed because if we had won today we could have gone into the lucky loser round.  This match does not count towards qualification for next year's Olympics, but we have had the chance to meet new teams and opponents who will be playing in London in 2012. We have learned a lot from playing better teams and improving skills such as serving. The other teams were better than us but we have learned a lot from the experience.

Speaking of future plans, Malaysia's Teck Hua, 31, who lives in Puchong, commented, "we leave and go back home to Malaysia. We will train a lot harder and practice the pick-up from the first serve and return the opponent's serve better. We're also going to have to change our hand signals."

The Visa FIVB Beach Volleyball International women's Olympic test event continues to Sunday, when the final four teams remaining will play the semifinals and medal matches on the Horse Guards Parade center court.