Crucial PBA-ABC 5 meeting Thursday; Gilas arrives in NZ

Smart Gilas Pilipinas arrives at Napier, New Zealand. Photo from head coach Chot Reyes Twitter account

THE PBA’S board of governors will meet at the league’s office today hoping to come to terms with ABC 5 for the telecast of its games in the coming Governors’ Cup and avoid being forced to do the coverage itself.

Representatives of all the teams and executives of the television outfit hope to iron out kinks in the proposal of ABC 5 to air the games on two channels which doesn’t sit well with members of the board.

ABC 5 wants to air the games—starting with this season’s Governors’ Cup—over IBC 13 or PTV 4 and over TV 5, with the first game of a regular doubleheader to be telecast on  either 13 or 4 before transferring to TV 5 for the second game.

It was a proposal that was shot down by several members of the board, which has, in turn, hinted at doing the television coverage itself and penalizing ABC 5 by millions of pesos for reneging on a P917-million, five-year contract signed in 2011.

“If we don’t come to terms, I think the PBA won’t have a choice (but do the coverage itself),” a source told the Inquirer over the phone yesterday.

A P70-million penalty can be levied on ABC 5 if negotiations fall through since the contract it signed with the PBA is for the television outfit to air the games on just one channel.

Meanwhile, Gilas-Pilipinas arrived in Napier, New Zealand, after a taxing 24-hour trip yesterday with stops in Hong Kong and Auckland.

The Nationals are in the last part of their preparation for the Fiba-Asia Championship that starts Aug. 1 and coach Chot Reyes and his staff have been very busy monitoring the opposition via video.

Reyes and his staff are watching games in the Jones Cup in Taiwan and the Stankovic Continental Cup in China and the firebrand mentor is impressed at what he has so far seen in the Chinese, Korean and Iranian national squads.

“China, Iran, Korea, Taipei look real sharp. We got our work cut out for us,” Reyes wrote on his Twitter account @coachot.

The Philippines is bracketed in Group A with the Taiwanese and Jordan and Saudi Arabia but won’t be meeting the three powerhouses until the first round of the KO stages if the Filipinos don’t top their preliminary group.