Padda blasts ref after ‘crucial’ call in Adamson win over UE

Photo by Tristan Tamayo/INQUIRER.net

Adamson University went tit-for-tat against University of the East just to get its five-set victory, 19-25, 25-11, 16-25, 25-16, 15-12, in the second round of the UAAP Season 80 women’s volleyball tournament.

And part of that exchange was a controversial call that Lady Falcons head coach Air Padda absolutely decried against.

First official Angelo Haw, who is a national referee, allowed a pancake on UE’s side after Lea Ann Perez’ hit.

Perez and her teammates began to celebrate after they felt they’ve scored 13-11 but Haw never blew his whistle to signal a point.

“There was no pancake, clearly the ball was down, it wasn’t even close to getting a pancake,” said Padda Sunday at Filoil Flying V Centre. “How do you call that a pancake? That was crucial.”

Adamson still got the 13-11 lead on the sequence when Laizah Ann Bendong’s pass to Mary Ann Mendrez went too high and landed out of bounds.

“Thank God we got the point, but if we hadn’t gotten the point what would’ve happened then the score would’ve been 12-12. You can’t do that in the fifth set and it pisses me off.”

The incident wasn’t the first time that the game officials drew the ire of Padda.

Adamson lost in five sets against University of the Philippines, 25-18, 14-25, 25-19, 21-25, 16-14, in its previous game and a similar situation happened and also in the fifth set when one of Diana Carlos’ spikes were ruled legal despite Padda’s insistence that it went out.

There was also Mylene Paat’s spike that was ruled out that gave UP a 12-10 lead in the fifth.

“I do believe we lost the fifth set to UP because of the refs, I do believe there were two controversial calls that you can’t make those calls in the fifth set,” added Padda. “You need to be perfect as a ref, and I believe the fifth set loss against UP was because of them.”