By REYNALD MAGALLON
Gilas Pilipinas is working double time with its preparation inside the Inspire Sports Academy in Laguna ahead of their European trip on Thursday, June 22.
National team head coach Chot Reyes, through a series of Instagram stories, shared that the Gilas pool members have been doing twice-a-day training sessions to make up for the lost time when the team had to deal with injuries and absences during its initial week-long practice at the Meralco Gym last week.
Gilas didn’t even take a break during the Sunday’s Father’s Day celebrations although Reyes shared, in a separate Instagram post, a slideshow paying tribute to the Gilas dads, both from the players and the coaching staff.
Ginebra star Scottie Thompson, celebrating his first Father’s day away from his newborn baby are joined by teammates Japeth Aguilar, CJ Perez, and Poy Erram in the short tribute video along with Gilas coaches, Reyes, himself, Jong Uichico, Tim Cone, Josh Reyes and Dex Aseron.
Still joining them in the training are June Mar Fajardo, Chris Newsome, Ange Kouame, AJ Edu, Rhenz Abanda, Kiefer and Thirdy Ravena, and Jamie Malonzo.
The team is trying to work on getting the player’s game shape back as most of them were coming off extended vacations – an objective Reyes wanted to achieve before flying for Estonia.
Gilas coaches are also hoping to quickly get both Edu and Abando accustomed to the system and playing with their teammates during the closed-door training camp.
Gilas is expected to experience top caliber competition during the Europe trip where it will be facing up against other national teams from Estonia, fellow world cup-bound Finland and Latvia and top clubs in Lithuania.
