EXCEPT for the occasional ACLC-WLC basketball rift, local sports news doesn’t merit controversy. This monotony is broken by a badminton tournament in Baybay wherein the most contested event was abruptly dissolved on dubious grounds (read more on the sports page).
The report merits attention because first, it involves one of the well known sports organizations there -- the Hapakers Badminton Club; second, the event is considered a major corporate tournament of sorts, participated by some of the big name companies in Baybay and Ormoc, and sponsored by the governor, congressman and mayor.
As has been mentioned, trouble arose when the championship match for the Team Event between the Ormoc team and Leyte Sports Academy (LSA) was called off. But going beyond the technicalities, one could smell a rat from afar upon finding out that tournament officials have their own interest on the teams.
Club President Emmanuel S. Licup is the managing director of SC Coco Global Products Inc. while tournament manager Peter Luke Valenzona is (drum roll please) the coach of LSA. So why are we not surprised? The organizers came up with reasons to dissolve the championship match, mainly the late payment of registration fee by the Ormoc team.
But why did the organizers allow the Ormoc team to qualify in the first place if late payment of registration fee would become an issue? Also, why did they have to wait for the team to survive the elimination matches before making a fuss? And did we mention that sore losers are fond of changing rules in the middle of the game?
Then they made an issue out of Ormoc team’s number of players. Citing their rules, a team should be composed of five players at most but Ormoc team fielded 10. The organizers suddenly become stickler of rules but forgot that they waived that rule as a compromise to allow LSA to take part in the Team Event.
Again, based on their own rules, the Team Event is a corporate category. The Ormoc team members consist of employees from the city government, Energy Development Corp. and National Grid Corp. of the Philippines, whereas LSA is composed of varsity players. But it’s so convenient to break that rule especially if you have the LSA coach as tournament manager, isn’t it?
The rat stench becomes even more obnoxious after SC Coco Global and Baybay Photographers Society withdrew their registration fees. To refresh our memories, club president Licup is a company official of SC Coco Global. Why would he cause embarrassment to his own tournament by allowing his own company to withdraw its registration fee?
Didn’t he realize that by doing so, there will be no budget left for prizes in the Team Event of which Ormoc team happens to be leading? Unless the move was staged to justify the dissolution of the match. And whatever happened to the sponsorship money they collected that was supposed to go to the prizes?
Here’s what we think. Despite missing the first day of the tournament, the Ormoc players managed to crawl their way up on top of the eliminations and some people in the club didn’t like it. Sports officials are expected to set the example on sportsmanship, not to manipulate rules.
Their misconduct may have deprived a rival team of bragging rights, but it exposed their real nature as “sportsmen.” What does Valenzona suppose this controversy teach his players? As for Licup, we hope his integrity as a company man survives this episode.
Unless they come up with more believable reasons for cancelling an important game, they can’t stop others from thinking that the event they mounted wasn’t a tournament but a sham.
(West Leyte Weekly Exress issue of Apr. 18-24, 2011)
No comments:
Post a Comment