Gilas Pilipinas head coach Tim Cone admitted that the team tried to bring in RR Pogoy to fill in the spot left by the absence of Scottie Thompson but visa problems prevented the TNT guard from joining the Nationals for its Europe trip.
Pogoy was invited and attended the Gilas three-day training camp at the Inspire Sports Academy in Laguna over the weekend in hopes of tapping him as a replacement for the injured Thompson but unfortunately things didn’t work out.
“It was a visa problem. We couldn’t get a visa in time for him,” Cone told reporters after Gilas’ friendly game against Taiwan Mustangs on Monday, June 25.
Pogoy has been on Cone’s radar ever since the Asian Games last year but the sharpshooter’s medical condition prevented him from joining the team.
The veteran tactician even revealed that they scoured for possible personnel who could fill in the void but time constraints just prevented Gilas from adding another player, resulting in Cone’s decision to just stick with his 11-man roster for the Olympic Qualifying tournament.
“We wanted other players. We talked to other players. But we couldn’t get anybody we wanted. I don’t want to go through the list of guys we talked to, but it was a long list,” revealed Cone.
“For some reason or another, it didn’t work out—whether it was a visa issue, or a family issue or whatever,” he added.
On top of that, the players familiarity and ability to learn the triangle offense is also in consideration for picking possible replacements.
Cone shared that assistant coach Josh Reyes offered one of his U17 players but the idea was scrapped as it would be hard to teach Cone’s system from the scratch and with only a few days left.
“We could’ve gotten—Josh was offering one of his players in U17 to get experience—but again I got to teach him how to run the triangle, the defense and that’s gonna be disruptive at this point. Ask Mason, Mason had a hard time,” Cone said.
“Unless we got another guy who could do the triangle, I think we’re better off going 11 strong,” he stressed.
