Vietnam sees no less than third in SEA Games

NHA TRANG CITY, Vietnam – Vietnam is eyeing no less than a top three finish in the 26th Southeast Asian Games slated Nov. 11-24 in Palembang and Jakarta, Indonesia.

Vietnam sports official Lam Quang Thanh told Viet Nam News, an English newspaper here, that since his country is competing in 36 of the 45 events calendared in the biennial meet, they’re eyeing a minimum of 70 gold medals which should be good enough for a spot in the top three.

Lam said his country, which is looking to win the medals in football and martial arts events like vovinam, karate, wushu, taekwondo and judo, is expected to contend with host Indonesia, traditional powerhouse Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore, not bothering to mention the Philippines.

If the Filipino officials would be right in their predictions, the country would win 55 gold medals which could only be good for fifth or sixth place overall.

The SEAG-bound Phl team hasn’t actually finalized its roster as some of the NSAs are still scrounging for private funding.

Businessmen Manny V. Pangilinan and Marty Eizmendi offered to bankroll the trip of some teams seeing action in Indonesia.

Three days ago, Smart and PLDT chairman Pangilinan pledged P10 million for the participation of athletes from basketball, boxing, football, badminton, tennis, cycling and taekwondo while Eizmendi agreed to finance the national baseball team’s Palembang trip, reportedly shelling out P2 million.

The Philippine Sports Commission has only allocated P30 million for the SEA Games, which is just enough to fund 424 athletes and 140 officials.

But there are 110 more Filipino athletes and 21 officials (technical, medical and administrative) knocking on the doors, and they include those from baseball, futsal, bridge (13), sports climbing (11), judo (3), fencing (3), badminton (3), athletics (2), gymnastics (2), golf (2) and cycling (1).