Reese backs Schooling to bounce back

Singapore swim star Joseph Schooling's performance at the Fina World Championships may have been "disappointing", but his coach Eddie Reese remains highly optimistic of his protege's journey towards the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Schooling had aimed to win the men's 50m and 100m butterfly, and break Michael Phelps' 100m fly world record of 49.82sec in Budapest, Hungary, but he finished fifth in the shorter race and joint-third in his pet event early yesterday morning (Singapore time).

His time of 50.83sec was some way off his Olympic-winning time of 50.39sec last August.

Reese, Schooling's coach at the University of Texas, said: "A disappointing performance doesn't have anything to do with the future except, we hope, making it better than it would have been.

"He is a great kid, he is really smart, he has to learn on his own."

Under Reese's guidance, Schooling won Singapore's first-ever Olympic gold medal in Rio last year, beating the likes of Michael Phelps, Chad le Clos and Laszlo Cseh.

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But the 22-year-old Singaporean took almost half a year off after that, despite Reese's advice to return to the pool, to recharge and seek a new purpose to his daily grind.

He paid a price for that at the National Collegiate Athletic Association swimming competition in March, when he failed to win an individual title, and he acknowledged yesterday that it also affected his performance at the Worlds.

After the 100m fly final, where he finished joint-third with Briton James Guy, behind gold medallist Caeleb Dressel and 17-year-old Hungarian Kristof Milak, Schooling said: "It just wasn't clicking. When you take six months off and only come back in December, January, that's what you get.

"Eddie warned me. I thought, 'What does this old guy know?', but it shows you know.

"I had to learn the hard way. I got my a** kicked. There's no other way to say it."

In response to that, Reese said yesterday: "There's nobody, that whatever I tell them, they are going to do.

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"We have this saying, that experience is the best teacher, but not the only teacher.

"I feel really good about our future. He's done a phenomenal job, and I want him to be better in the 100m and 200m freestyle, and he can do all of that stuff."

The veteran coach is also confident that Schooling can still better Phelps' 100m fly world record, but stopped short of saying if his student could beat Dressel, who is the break-out star in Budapest.

The 20-year-old American clocked 49.86sec to win the 100m fly, and also won the 50m free and 4x100m mixed freestyle relay yesterday morning.

It was the first time a swimmer had won three gold medals on a single night at either the Worlds or the Olympics.

Reese said: "Joseph has the ability to beat Michael Phelps' record. Caeleb, we cannot control. He's a big kid, real strong.

"He's the only guy I know who can beat Joe on the start in the kick out."

While Schooling acknowledged that his finishing had been problematic in Hungary, both Reese and Singapore Swimming Association technical director Sonya Porter agreed that the butterfly king does not have major problems to fix.

Porter said: "There's nothing really pressing (to fix), the first thing is for him to set his mind where he is going, and just break it down, decide and understand what needs to happen from this year. It's a build-up."

Reese added: "I don't want miracles. I don't want him training so hard that he bleeds every day.

"Just do what I ask - I don't tell him what to do. They (my swimmers) are all bigger and stronger than I am. I ask them and, for the most part, they do (what I ask of them)."