History Repeats Itself As Soh Rui Yong is Now Excluded from Asian Games 2023

By
Chew Ming Hui
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What’s in the past is in the past.

This phrase rings true for most, but not for one of Singapore’s most controversial athletes—Soh Rui Yong.

What’s in the past constantly comes back to haunt him. Here’s why.

Soh Rui Yong Excluded From Asian Games 2023 Despite Impressive Performance in SEA Games 2023

The national long-distance runner Soh Rui Yong has repeatedly found himself in the limelight for a laundry list of things.

Oh, Soh Rui Yong is on the news again? Hedge your bets—is it for a sporting achievement, a legal suit, or a rant from the Singapore National Olympic Council (SNOC)?

This time, the 31-year-old is on the news again because of how dulan SNOC is with him.

Ah, history repeats itself.

If you didn’t already know, the Asian Games will be held from 23 September to 8 October in Hangzhou, China. The initial list of selected Asian Games athletes issued in April 2022 did not include Soh Rui Yong despite Singapore Athletics’ (SA) nomination.

You can smell the beef cooking from miles away.

The national runner’s subsequent appeal to the SNOC’s appeals committee was also to no avail. On Thursday (8 June), it was revealed that Soh Rui Yong was excluded from SNOC’s latest list of successful appeals.

This was despite the athlete having met the Asian Games qualifying mark in the 10,000m event and his impressive performance in the recent SEA Games, where he clinched a silver medal in the 10,000m finals. This was Singapore’s first SEA Games medal in the 10,000m event in 40 years.

When Soh Rui Yong eats fast food, it just becomes food.

Looking at SNOC’s selection criteria for the Asian Games, it appears that the 31-year-old meets most of the achievement-based considerations.

So, why was the two-time SEA Games marathon champion’s appeal to be part of the Asian Games rejected?

Exclusion of Soh Rui Yong Was A Result of His Failure to Honour Commitments

According to a SNOC spokesman, the appeals committee rejected the athlete’s appeal due to his persistent failure to honour his commitments to SNOC.

The commitment in question is to “conduct himself in a more constructive, mature and professional manner”. This includes avoiding “posting controversial content on social media” and making “disparaging and derisive remarks about others in the public domain”.

Essentially, Soh Rui Yong promised SNOC to be on his best behaviour but broke it lah.

And SNOC has detailed receipts of all the times Soh Rui Yong broke his promise.

Wah. This one worse than your psycho ex sia.

According to The Straits Times, one week before the SNOC’s appeals committee convened, the SNOC sent two documents to SA setting out all the problems SNOC had with the athlete.

Macam break up text.

SA and Soh Rui Yong now had some homework to do.

The first document was a whopping 30 pages long, detailing the remarks made by Soh Rui Yong on social media from March to May.

The second document, fortunately, came in shorter at six pages, detailing comments made by the 31-year-old on a podcast.

After reviewing the documents, Soh Rui Yong eventually deleted the comments that SNOC had problems with.

“Disparaging and Derisive Remarks” Made By Soh Rui Yong

How much does it take to piss the SNOC off? Well, apparently, not a lot. Remarks made by Soh Rui Yong, which SNOC flagged, ranged from playful banter to tongue-in-cheek comments about the SNOC.

For one, SNOC wasn’t happy with the recent anecdote that the runner dropped in the Silverfox Hustle podcast.

On the podcast, Soh Rui Yong shared how a fellow Team Singapore athlete started sobbing once the national anthem started playing at the SEA Games, remarking: “In my head I’m like, siao ah, cry. In school you hear the anthem you cry meh?”

Rehearsal just in case the camera pans to the athlete during NDP, we suppose.

SNOC also flagged a couple of the runner’s Instagram comments.

In one post wherein the runner shared a photo of himself with Titus Low, the influencer jailed last year for his OnlyFans content, Soh received a comment about how his OnlyFans journey was also commencing.

In response, the runner commented: “come bro threesome”.

We bet reading that comment made someone at SNOC contemplate searching up “resignation letter template”.

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Aside from these, the SNOC also flagged other remarks by Soh about the SNOC and his former teammate Ashley Liew, to whom he lost a defamation suit several years ago.

As a result of all these moments that SNOC views as Soh Rui Yong running his mouth, the athlete, unfortunately, will not compete in the upcoming Asian Games.

Not Soh Rui Yong’s First Time Being Excluded By SNOC

Despite his exclusion from the Asian Games, the runner has decided to look on the bright side.

In an Instagram post on Friday (9 June), the runner wrote that he had received “[s]surprising news”, which seems to allude to the news of his exclusion from the Asian Games.

He continues by sharing that despite the news, he’ll be choosing to “focus on the positives”—the opportunity to organise the POCARI SWEAT 2.4km National Championships for the third year in a row.

At least the runner doesn’t seem to make snarky remarks about the SNOC in this post.

This Asian Games incident is far from the first time the SNOC has excluded Soh Rui Yong from representing Team Singapore in major sporting events.

If there were a sporting event for who can piss SNOC off the most, Soh Rui Yong would definitely be the defending champion.

Having had beef with SNOC since 2017, the 31-year-old was excluded by the SNOC for the 2019 and 2021 SEA Games despite meeting the qualifying mark.

In response, Soh Rui Yong made two apologies to the SNOC last year in hopes of being able to race for Singapore again—and he finally did in the recent SEA Games before the current saga arose.

He might be a fast runner, but he can never run from everything that has transpired between him and SNOC.

So(h), what do you think will happen next? Will Soh Rui Yong issue another apology to SNOC, or will we never see the 31-year-old blaze the track for Team Singapore again?

Watch this for a complete summary of what REALLY happened to Qoo10, and why it's like a K-drama:

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Chew Ming Hui
Email: [email protected]