INQUIRER Sports

IT WAS A SUBTLE WAY OF telling the Smart Gilas national team it?s not welcome in the Philippine Basketball Association.

This was the reaction of Noli Eala, the former PBA commissioner and now executive director of the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, after the pro league declared as no-bearing all games played and to be played by Smart Gilas as a guest squad in the ongoing KFC-PBA Philippine Cup.

?We?ve been given a set of rules before the tournament started and those options are not included in the conditions,? said Eala. ?This is a surprise.?

Under the directive from commissioner Sonny Barrios, the victories by Burger King, Barangay Ginebra and Talk ?N Text over Smart Gilas will be stricken off the PBA teams? overall record.

?We are convinced that it is in everyone?s best interest if both teams go into the game with the same mindset that the game has no bearing,? said Barrios in his letter to Eala.

?Both Smart Gilas and the PBA opposing team, and their players, will thus be on equal footing as far as their outlook and approach of the game are concerned.?

But Eala said there was ?never any objection or condition that he (Giles) will not be allowed to play and on the manner that we run the team.?

?It?s their way of telling us subtly that they don?t want us to play in the PBA,? Eala added.

Aiming to clinch an Asian spot to the 2012 London Olympics, Gilas is using the PBA experience to toughen up for the 2011 Fiba-Asia Championship, the qualifying event for the Olympiad.