By: Chia Han Keong

FRANKLY, Singaporeans are barking up the wrong tree by lamenting about the lack of crowds at the Asian Youth Games (AYG).

After all, the AYG, as well as next year's inaugural Youth Olympic Games (YOG) to be hosted by the Republic, is not intended to be money-spinners.

And - between you and me - most of the die-hard supporters of Singapore sports would have already signed up as Games volunteers.

The rest of the public would gravitate towards events where the local athletes have a chance of winning. Thus, the swimming and bowling competitions have been well-supported.

What we should be more concerned about are the frustrating experiences and, worse, shattered dreams that have unfortunately tarnished the Games.

The frustrating experiences are the lighter of the "sins". I'm referring to the complaints from fans who bought tickets for matches that were rescheduled or cancelled without their prior knowledge, such as when the Hong Kong and Philippines soccer teams called off their matches because some of their players had contracted the H1N1 flu.

Readers wrote in to complain even before the Games officially began. No one had bothered to inform them about the cancellations, which caused many of them to turn up at the gates, only to be disappointed.

Such complaints surfaced again during the beach-volleyball competition.

While the organisers have apologised for the hiccups, these instances must be minimised as much as possible to avoid ruining our hard-earned reputation as a well-run nation.

But such matters can be resolved easily. Shattering athletes' dreams because of a fartoo- rigid adherence to rules and policies is, on the other hand, much harder to put right.

To stop girl basketballers from Kuwait and Bahrain from playing simply because they were wearing hijabs (headscarves) is inconsiderate to young athletes who dream of competing for their country.

To deprive local runner Zachary Ryan Devaraj of competing in his pet event because of a 19-hour wait for the results of his H1N1 test - which proved negative, by the way - is just plain callous.

In both instances, the organisers stuck to the rulebook when they should have given some leeway to these young athletes.

Because that's what the Games is about - not ticketing profits, not showing off our efficency, but sowing dreams among young athletes.

Destroy such enthusiasm, and there would be no point in hosting the Games.

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