Despite Gilas coach Chot Reyes’ reservation on the readiness of the team due to the late arrival of its naturalized player Adray Blatche, Gilas is still the overwhelming favorite to win over the Myanmar team.
A win by the country’s national team is important because it will serve as a morale booster for the team when they face competitive opponents as they progress in the week-long tournament.
For its second game Gilas will face the Singapore national team on Saturday at 7:00 p.m. View full schedule here.
The winner for the week-long tournament will represent SEABA in the 2017 FIBA Asia Cup which will take place in Lebanon from August 10 to August 20, 2017.
South East Asian countries participating the the 2017 SEABA Games include Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Read more:
The Philippine team is composed to selected top players in the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) which include Calvin Abueva, Japeth Aguilar, Raymond Almazan, Andray Blatche, June Mar Fajardo, Allein Maliksi, Jovani Jalalon, Roger Pogoy, Terence Romeo, Troy Rosario, Jason Castro and Matthew Wright
Blatche, who arrived Sunday had only a few days to assimilate himself with the new members of the team, said in a press conference on Wednesday at the Crowne Plaza that the team won’t be complacent even if they are favored to win.
“When everybody expects you to win, you still have to come out and perform, you still have to come out and win, (and) you still have to come out and compete,” Blatche said.
“I don’t want us to go out there, taking it that we’ll have it easy. We’re quite sure that a lot of the teams, they think that they have a chance of knocking us down,” he added.
Blatche is joining the Gilas team for the second time but due to the changes in the roster of the new team, he has to make extra effort to blend well with the team leading up to the first game on Friday night.
