Tokyo Olympics 2020 men’s doubles bronze medallist Soh Wooi Yik hopes fellow shuttler Goh Jin Wei will succeed in other fields after announcing her retirement from badminton two days ago.
Wooi Yik said although the former junior world champion’s decision came as a shock to many, he was sure that the 21-year-old must have considered the matter long and hard due to her health problems, which caused her to reduce her food intake and, thus, made it difficult for her to train.
“I have known Jin Wei for a long time, and I sympathise with the situation she has to go through every day during training. She has to take medication daily and, because of that, she can’t eat much, causing her not to have much energy. “Her condition would worsen during tournaments. As an athlete, health and fitness are a way of life but this is a decision she made”.
Earlier, singles shuttler Jin Wei had stunned the badminton fraternity when she announced her retirement as she is still struggling with health issues after undergoing surgery to remove part of her colon due to a stomach ailment in 2019.
Jin Wei is the only national shuttler to have won the junior world title twice, at the 2015 edition in Lima, Peru and 2018 edition in Markham, Canada. She also won gold at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires, Argentina and the 2017 Kuala Lumpur SEA Games.