Pinoys drop to 8th: Cheers for Myanmar, tears for Phl

NAY PYI TAW – While host Myanmar celebrated another surge in the medal standings and Singapore and Cambodia took huge strides, tears flowed throughout the day and night, literally and figuratively, for a Philippine team that finished the day at eighth and is now on the verge of self-destruction in the 27th Southeast Asian Games.

Iris Rañola, the 9-ball defending champion, goes into today’s event still grieving the loss of her father, while Jasmine Alkhaldi saw her gold medal turn to stone in the “re-swim” of the 100m freestyle.

Her teammates could not do better either as Joshua Hall, trained in the US, finished also with a bronze in the 100m breaststroke while Olympian Jessie King Lacuna, mentored by national coach Pinky Brosas, was fifth in the 100m freestyle.

Matt Navata also finished fourth in the 400m individual medley late Thursday.

Jason Balabal accounted for the other bronze through the 84kg freestyle event, capping his failure to bring home a third straight Games gold. With his collapse, wrestling completed the competitions without a win, settling for only two silvers and four bronze medals.

The Philippines plunged to eighth place with three gold medals which went unchanged the last three days. It was overtaken by Singapore at sixth with eight gold medals and Cambodia at seventh with four. Up in the standings are Myanmar with 26, Vietnam 22, Indonesia 21, Thailand 21 and Malaysia 10.

A consolation for the billiards team is that the Filipinos are fancied to win the world 9-ball and 10-ball events, good for four golds. The Smart Gilas team is also on course for a gold medal while surprises could be pulled off in karate, judo and chess in the next few days.

The Malditas bowed to Vietnam, 0-7, for their second straight loss and an early exit from the female football competitions at the Mandalar Thiri Field over in Mandalay.

The Filipinas were simply no match for the Vietnamese, who scored two goals in the first 10 minutes of the match and continued pouring on the heat the rest of the way.

Hermie Macaranas wound up fifth in canoeing’s 200m single sculls while Alex Generalo failed to even get past kayaking’s K1 200m semifinals.

Niño Surban’s sixth place finish was the best among the four Filipino riders in cycling’s cross country.

Karatedo’s OJ delos Santos lost out on a podium finish after bowing to Myanmar’s Min Hein Khant, 1-4, in the first round and to 2011 champion Faizal Zainuddin of Indonesia, 0-5, in the repechage of men’s individual kata.