In a competition between robots, King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi team won over the Tonkla team from Ramkhamhaeng University with a score of 21 in the Humanoid Robot Soccer Championship final round at King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi last Friday.
The winning team will now go on to the world championships for robot teams in June.
"Thailand RoboCup Soccer Humanoid League helps us develop the capabilities of Thai university students in robotics technology and automation," said Assistant Professor Dr Jackrit Suthakorn, president of the Thai Robotics Society.
From 29 teams in the competition, only two were left in the final round - King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi, and Tonkla from Ramkhamhaeng University. In this final round, both teams had to build two humanlike robots with the ability to play soccer and compete in soccer matches.
The final round began as both teams put their robots into the field. All robots seemed to have trouble locating the ball at first, but KMUTT soon zeroed in. Tonkla's robots rallied, however, achieving first score in the first half of the game.
Right before the second half, it was noticed Tonkla's robots were slow to boot up and KMUTT gained their first score a couple of minutes into the half. And that was the last score either team managed for the match, even though the committee extended time for another 10 minutes.
It came to a kick off.
Each team had 5 shots and one minute each to make each one. None managed to boost their score. Eventually, the match ended with a sudden death round when whoever makes a score first, wins.Victory went to KMUTT team from Thonburi.
"I feel delighted our team has won. We had only 2 or 3 months to prepare. There are still some drawbacks in both robots, but we plan to improve our robots to compete in the World Robocup Soccer: Humanoid League in Singapore," said Sukrit Manokhatiphaisan, a member of the KMUTT team.
The winning team won a cash prize of Bt200,000 and will represent Thailand at the World Robocup Soccer: Humanoid League in Singapore this June.
