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Thursday, February 26, 2004
Walkout mars tryouts
By Christian B. Rodriguez
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
A WALKOUT marred Tuesday’s gymnastics tryouts for the upcoming International Children’s Games (ICG) at the Cebu City Sports Center.
Apparently upset when a member of his team was not allowed to join the tryout, University of Southern Philippines gymnastics director Jeffrey Villa ordered his athletes to walk out of the tryouts. Although Villa, who is also the Team Cebu City-Gymnastics head, was in Bantayan island during the tryout, he communicated to his daughter, who was one of the aspirants, through a cellular phone.
Cebu City sports commissioners Calixto Pacquiao and Rolly Diorico and CCSC executive director Allan Torrevillas, who attended the tryouts, said they did not allow the athlete to join the tryout as she was not in the original list and was merely an add-on. They said they were instructed by Cebu City sports chairman Jonathan Guardo to only accept gymnasts whose names appear on the originzal list of athletes.
“Of all people, he (Villa) must know how to follow rules and guidelines,” Pacquiao said. “There was no approval from Guardo for that athlete to take part in the try-out and she was not in the original list submitted by Villa earlier.
“As a sports director, there must be no biased decisions made and he himself must be fair to all the gymnasts,” said Pacquiao, who added that he felt sorry for the USP gymnasts affected by Villa’s decision to stage a walkout.
Villa could not be reached for comment yesterday.
There were supposed to be three gymnastics slots open for the games, which will be held in Cleveland this July. After the walkout, the screening committee decided to bring only two gymnasts, both from the University of the Visayas.
(February 26, 2004 issue)
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