Filipino table tennis icon Richard Gonzales vows to play on

MANILA, Philippines – At 51 years old, Richard Gonzales isn’t done playing for the national team just yet.

In fact, the Filipino table tennis living legend is eyeing nothing less than delivering the country’s first ever Southeast Asian Games gold medal in next year’s edition in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

“I can still do it,” said Gonzales during an interview in the Philippine Sports Commission’s online People Sports Conversations show Thursday. “And with your prayers and support, we will try to win the gold in Cambodia.”

Gonzales earned his outright spot to the Phnom Penh-bound national team along with John Russel Misal after the duo delivered a silver in last month’s Hanoi Southeast Asian Games.

And it could have been a gold — the country’s first in its SEA Games participation in the sport — had Gonzales and Misal held on to set point in the fourth game and force a deciding fifth game where momentum would surely be on their side.

It wasn’t meant to be though.

“We felt if we took that fourth set, we would have gotten momentum and win the gold,” Misal, a former UAAP MVP, for his part said.

Philippine Table Tennis Federation president Ting Ledesma said they will hold a national team selection for the eight remaining spots to the Cambodia-bound squad — five females and three male.

“John Russel and Richard are assured of their spot to the SEA Games. The rest will have to compete for the remaining eight slots to the team,” said Ledesma.