Days after the free-for-all melee that happened between Gilas Pilipinas and the Australia Boomers, officials from the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas have always warned everyone to brace for the worst.
The worst could have been the SBP being suspended by FIBA or the country’s hosting of the 2023 FIBA World Cup being removed from the Philippines.
Fortunately, none of those happened.
“So if there’s any good news, that’s the good news,” expressed SBP president Al Panlilio.
Still, the SBP, who were fined CHF 250,000 (PHP 13,369,331.76), picked up a lot of learnings from the incident with regards to the safety of both the home team and the visitors. And it includes what to do when fans get involved with the game.
“No, in fact we should.. we’ll do better because we will learn from this experience. As I said, a big part of the sanction of the federation is the venue security, making sure that the teams are secured and safe,” thought Panlilio.
“They were safe naman. In my view, they were safe in the arena. I was there personally, but maybe for somebody… we just want to make sure that we can make them feel more secure so we can learn from that incident. I think if you look at it, maybe stricter on passes, ano yung access, we have to be strict with that, making sure lang that nobody from the stand can come in,” he added.
“We can improve in a few things.”
The 2023 World Cup is being co-hosted by the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia.
