PBA: No coaches in practices once approved by IATF

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

PBA commissioner Willie Marcial said that once the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Disease (IATF) approves their letter of request in allowing PBA teams to practice under the general community quarantine (GCQ), the head coaches of the teams won’t be allowed to participate and enter facility premises.

Due to the league’s strict safety protocols, the PBA board decided to hold the head coaches’ participation citing that the practices will be purely for conditioning training only.

“Baka itong practices, wala pang mga coaches. Conditioning lang naman ito,” Marcial said in the official website of the PBA.

In the letter passed to the IATF, teams will be conducting practice sessions in batches of 4 members, one trainer, and one health officer to make sure that the team is practicing and following safety protocols.

Also, scrimmages, five-on-five drills, tune-up games, team huddling, and occupying the full space of the benches are still banned until further notice.

Meanwhile, one of the factors that pushed the decision of the board is because four head coaches in the PBA are at least 60-years-old. The IATF is strongly discouraging people from that age bracket from social activities because they are highly-susceptible to obtaining the virus.