KUALA LUMPUR, March 10: German Paul Lissek has been fired as Malaysia's top field hockey coach for the second time in six months after the team was dumped out of Olympic competition for the first time in 16 years.

Malaysia's performance in its 2-1 loss to Belgium overnight in Spain was panned at home, where critics for months have been saying the sport's administration and planning are a shambles and fresh blood is urgently needed.

"Losing to Belgium, a country better known for its cycling and its chocolates, is unacceptable," Lazarus Rokk, sports editor of leading newspaper the New Straits Times, wrote in a column Wednesday. "Just when we thought our hockey couldn't sink any lower, we manage so skillfully to extend our horizons of shame."

Malaysia was a top contender in field hockey in the late 1980s and 90s, and Lissek helped the national side win silver at the 1998 Commonwealth Games, put in a respectable performance at the 2000 Olympics and take bronze at the Asian Games in 2002.

But the team has since fallen from grace amid a string of poor results, including a disappointing eighth at the World Cup in 2002 and a dismal last in the eight-nation Sultan Shah Azlan invitational last year _ both of which Malaysia hosted.

In October, the National Sports Council ordered the Malaysian Hockey Federation to fire Lissek after the team was bundled out of the Asia Cup, but then recanted after players threatened a walkout and no suitable replacement could be found.

This week's Olympic qualifiers in Spain were Lissek's chance to redeem himself. But National Sports Council director-general Mazlan Ahmad said Lissek would be demoted following Malaysia's loss in the pre-Olympic competition.

"I spoke to Lissek before the qualifiers started and it was agreed that if he fails to guide the team into the Athens Olympics, he will be redesignated as a development officer," Mazlan was quoted as saying Wednesday in the New Straits Times.

Lissek, whose contract doesn't expire until 2005, will take up duties as a talent scout, he said. Mazlan said the council had finished with foreign coaches and would try to find a Malaysian replacement, though no announcement was likely until after the Olympics. -APP/AP