By KRISTEL SATUMBAGA
The Premier Volleyball League is looking at holding the Open Conference without an audience once the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) allows team sports to resume.
The plan is part of the league’s safety measures amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“If we’ll be able to hold our Open Conference this year, it will probably be closed-door, no audience,” said organizer Sports Vision President Ricky Palou in Tuesday night’s podcast.
Palou is confident participating teams and players will give it their all even without the fans cheering them on.
“I’m not sure how the players and teams will react and how they will play even without an audience. But I hope they’ll be mature enough to play and give it their best,” he said.
Palou, however, assured everyone they will slowly bring the fans if the government relaxes its quarantine protocols.
“Eventually, we’ll slowly bring in the fans, maybe one seat apart for social distancing purposes,” he said.
The PVL had made it known that it is targeting to launch its tournament in September, but if situation does not improve it is willing to push it back since Metro Manila remains under general community quarantine.
“We’re hopeful we’ll be able to hold something before the year ends and we’re asking all our teams and players to stay in shape,” said Palou.
The PVL has already drawn participation from nine teams including defending champion Creamline, which will be bringing back the same core of their deep team headed by Alyssa Valdez.
The other squads seeing action are PetroGazz, BanKo-Perlas, Choco Mucho, Motolite, Bali Pure, Chef’s Classic, Army and Air Force.
Palou also said they are planning to follow the move of the PBA in requesting the IATF to resume team training and eventually holding the tournament.
“We’re planning to do that. I’m preparing something for all the teams to look at, review and hopefully they’ll come back with some good feedback. We’ll prepare all of this together then we’ll make the formal request,” he said.
