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lthough unlikely to be a source of gold medals, the National Sports Council (KONI) has decided to expand its participation in five more sports at the upcoming Asian Games in China.

“Our [women’s] softball and [men’s] indoor volleyball players have qualified for the Asian Games so they deserve to be there, although they’re probably long shots for gold,” KONI sports development chief Djoko Pramono said Monday, after a plenary meeting between KONI and the mainstay athlete unit of the high-performance Indonesian Gold Program (PRIMA).

The women’s softball team qualified for the Games for the first time after placing well at the Asian Women’s Softball Championship in Jakarta in 2007.

The indoor volleyball men’s team, gold medallists at last year’s Southeast Asian Games in Laos, were able to boost their Asia ranking from 15th to sixth.

Billiards, boxing and shooting athlete have also been welcomed into the Indonesian squad to the Games. The contingent had previously comprised athletes from 20 of the 42 featured sports at the Games.

Pool aces Irsal Nasution, runner-up at the recent Guinness World Series of Pool 10 Ball in Jakarta, and Ricky Yang, winner of the 2009 Philippines Open Pool Championships, will be medal hopefuls at the Games.

Indonesian boxers, including Indri Sambaimana in the women’s flyweight 51-kilogram class, Matius Mandingan in the men’s bantamweight 54-kilogram class, and Achmad Amri in the men’s light heavyweight 81-kilogram class, each snatched silver at the biennial SEA Games in Laos.

The three shooters new to the squad are SEA Games gold medallist in the women’s individual 50-meter rifle prone Erlinawati, and silver medallists Maharani Ardy and Rachma Saraswati.

“The respective sports associations must submit documents by Sept. 3 so that we can forward them to the official committee in Guangzhou,” Djoko said, denying that registration closed in July.

“We will work that out,” he said, adding that he expected the contingent to include 361 people, 244 of whom were athletes. This is slightly larger than the initial estimate of 313 people.

The inclusion of the five sports in the squad will also result in a Rp 3 billion (US$330 million) addition to the estimated Rp 15 billion price tag for sending the contingent to Guangzhou for the Games, which run from Nov. 12-27.

Four years ago in Doha, Qatar, the Indonesian squad won two gold medals through shuttler Taufik Hidayat and bowler Ryan Leonard Lalisang, three silver medals and 15 bronze medals.

Meanwhile, following the country’s dismal showing at the recent inaugural Youth Olympic Games in Singapore, Djoko, who also heads the youth athlete unit in PRIMA, said he expected the Rp 30 billion start-up fund to develop 300 youth athletes around the archipelago would soon be disbursed.