The National Olympic Committee of Cambodia has resolved to strongly lobby for the inclusion of the 73kg class in the taekwondo competition at next year’s SEA Games, which Malaysia will be hosting for the first time since 2001.

The secretary-general of NOCC, Vath Chamroeun, who left Phnom Penh on Tuesday for a crucial meeting with the SEA Games Federation in Kuala Lumpur, said Cambodia will fight hard to get this category restored after Malaysia announced its intention to keep it out of the 2017 edition.

“This is the category that best suits our Asian Games gold medallist and Rio Olympics qualifier Sorn Seavmey.

“The 2015 Singapore Games did not offer this class, which left Seavmey with the difficult decision of whether to lose weight to fit into the lower categories”, Chamroeun said.

Seavmey eventually backed out of the SEA Games entirely to focus on securing qualification for this year’s Olympic Games in Rio in her favoured weight category.

Cambodia will also throw its full weight behind an effort by several countries seeking the inclusion of wrestling, Japanese martial art shorinji kempo and Vietnamese martial art vovinam that Singapore left out, a decision that Malaysia has already announced it would abide by.

Meanwhile, Tennis Cambodia has also joined the chorus of countries demanding the restoration of the full quota of seven medals in tennis.

The Malaysian organisers had caused a storm when they announced that the team events and the mixed doubles would be axed in 2017.

The Olympic Council of Malaysia announced last week the inclusion of judo, fencing, muay Thai and triathlon to raise the total number of competing disciplines to 38 spread over 403 events. This list will be placed before the two Federation meeting for approval.