PSC plans regional elims for PNG

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine National Games will be reformatted from an open tournament to an elite competition where only “qualified” bets will be allowed to take part.

According to chairman Richie Garcia of the organizing Philippine Sports Commission, this is meant to avoid grave mismatches when “walk-in” greenhorns get matched up with elite athletes and find themselves overwhelmed as what’s happening in the set-up of the past editions.

“We have observed in the last PNG in Manila (last summer), there were many walk-in participants who actually had no business participating. They weren’t really qualified and as a result they got beaten black and blue by the qualified athletes in sports like boxing,” said Garcia.

Beginning next year, the PSC boss said regional qualifying events will be held to screen who will progress to a national finals.

“To make sure that only qualified athletes will participate in the PNG, we’ll have regional tournaments in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. Winners will participate in the national finals in early 2016. The national finals will now be held every other year,” said Garcia.

The new PNG will take the cue from the PSC’s youth program, the Batang Pinoy Games, which stage regional qualifiers before assembling the medalists in a grand finale.

Meanwhile, the PSC has tapped Koronadal, South Cotabato as host of the Mindanao qualifying leg of the Batang Pinoy 2015.

It’s some sort of consolation for Koronadal after recently losing its hosting bid for next year’s Palarong Pambansa to Tagum City.

Koronadal’s staging of the Batang Pinoy leg, according to commissioner-in-charge Jolly Gomez, will serve as one of the highlights of the town’s 75th founding anniversary in 2015.