Despite pandemic surge, PBA puts players on standby on return to training

"Dapat maging ready sila."

This was the marching order of commissioner Willie Marcial to all the teams in the Philippine Basketball Association, as it gears up for the resumption of the 45th season which was halted by the coronavirus pandemic.

On his return to the weekly forum of the Philippine Sportswriters' Association Tuesday morning, he already revealed their restart plans with all the teams' executives as there are some changes to their protocols with regards to the testing involving the players, coaches and even their auxiliary staff before getting back to their training on June 22 the earliest.

"Ngayon lahat swab [testing], three days before or bago mag-practice swab na rin," Marcial said as it was suggested by Ginebra team governor Alfrancis Chua.

The said testing will be held at the facilities of San Miguel Corporation, which will be shouldered by all teams concerned.

Despite the surge in the cases, the league is still on track to resume operations as everyone is virus-free as of the moment. That has brought optimism to the league's top executive, in which he hopes that the repercussions will be at a minimum given the fact that they training will be by clusters.

In a cluster, only four players, a coach or a trainer, and a safety officer will be allowed to train. Should the situation improves, the PBA is looking to request from the Inter-Agency Task Force on easing the restrictions and gradually allow them to return to normal practices.

"By August, susulat ako sa Task Force baka payagan tayo mag-scrimmages," he added, as there are fines along the way for the players who will violate the closed-circuit concept that the league is implementing.

“Ang players dapat bahay, sasakyan, gym. So dapat huwag kang aalis (sa concept),” Marcial said about the guidelines, with a minimum penalty of five thousand pesos (P 5,000) will be slapped on those violators.

Even the safety officers are not even spared, with the league imposing a hefty twenty thousand peso fine (P 20,000) on them.

The league hopes that the honesty and the transparency of the players will be honored alongside discipline, especially that there should be prior notice about going out of the concept.

“Kung lalabas ka at pupunta sa supermarket or drugstore dahil hindi mo naman maiiwasan, kailangan sabihin mo kasi may (daily) log kami. Dapat may disiplina talaga.” 

Should the games finally resume, the league is also mulling to propose measures to limit the game-day capacity, and that even includes the press corps.

"Madami, para mag-iingat din tayong  lahat. Kelangan may testing din kayo," he then said.

File Photo: PBA