Singapore fencer Amita Berthier not going to Paris Olympics to make up the numbers

SINGAPORE: Ask Singapore fencer Amita Berthier about killer instinct, and the 23-year-old might bring up the time her coach Oleg Matseichuk made her watch a video of two animals fighting.

In the YouTube clip, a mongoose fends off the attack of a venomous cobra, with the furry mammal eventually emerging victorious.

“He (Matseichuk) was like: ‘I want you to be be like this,” Berthier told CNA on the sidelines of a media event on Thursday (Apr 4). “I'm training myself every day to understand how to be a cold-blooded killer.”

Matseichuk joined Fencing Singapore last November as the national team's foil head coach and was previously head coach of the Japan national fencing team from 2003 to 2021.

Among the highlights of the Ukrainian's long stint in Japan include leading Yuki Ota to the men's individual foil silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the men’s foil team to silver at the 2012 London Olympics.

“Once a bear or a lion attacks, there is the taste of blood, they like it,” Matseichuk told CNA. “She doesn’t have that feeling yet. That feeling and mood of a predator and killer.”

While Matseichuk believes that Berthier has the ability and quality, what she needs is the “confidence of a winner” as she prepares for the Paris Olympics in July.

“I make people bigger than they are, and not realise my potential, how good that I can be. I think once I get that killer mentality, (being) out for blood, I really can achieve even greater things than I have right now," said Berthier, a three-time SEA Games gold medallist.

"Having coach Oleg as my coach, he tends to remind me not to have my expectations so low and he’s very wise. He helped me believe in myself because sometimes, I don’t give myself enough credit or I doubt my