Petanque World Championships to kick off next Tuesday
Thai teams hoping to win gold on home soil
Ariyawat Nuamsawat
The 43rd World Petanque Championships will get under way in a few days time in Pattaya and run from September 18 - 23. The organizers had a last minute race to finish the competition field at the Pattaya Indoor Stadium in time for the tournament, but it is now 100% complete. And in lieu of this, the French national team (former World Champions) will train on the competition field this coming Saturday.
Altogether there will be 54 teams representing 51 nations at this prestigious event: former world champions, including France and Thailand, are automatically granted the right to enter two teams instead of just the one for the other nations.
And the Thai national team has high aspirations for this coming event with the Thailand Team A being made up of two-time world champion Thaloengkiat Phoosa-Ard, Pakin Phookram, Supan Thongphoo, and rising star Seksan Pliachan being strongly fancied.
ACM Kamthon Sindhvananda (President of the Petanque Association of Thailand under Royal Sponsorship) said that the association has been preparing for this competition for more than 1 year and that the Thai players are ready for this championship.
“Hopefully the Thai sportsmen will be able to have good results, but they aren’t expected to be the winners, because it won’t be easy with over 50 teams from different countries in participation,” said ACM Kamthon. “If the team was only able to make it to the finals, that would be a great success. It is wished to see the sportsmen play their best for our Majesty the King. The reason why we organized this competition was to celebrate HM the King’s 80th anniversary”, he added.
Pattaya Mail