National team assistant coach Tai Bundit set to fly home to Thailand. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine National Volleyball Federation is set to convene on Friday to decide whether it would find a replacement for assistant coach Tai Bundit in the women’s national team.
Tony Boy Liao, the chairman of the PNVF national team department, said the national coaches commission will discuss their plans following the departure of Bundit, who resigned from his posts in the national team and Creamline due to COVID-19 concerns in his home country of Thailand.
Bundit, who will fly to Thailand Thursday night, tendered his resignation so he could spend time with his family.
“The national coaches commission will convene tomorrow to decide whether we should replace coach Tai,” said Liao Thursday. “If they do decide to replace him, then we’ll need to find a replacement.”
He has three children with the oldest in high school and a younger set of twins in grade school.
Bundit, a two-time UAAP champion with Ateneo, arrived in the Philippines from Thailand to coach the Cool Smashers in the PVL Open Conference.
The Thai coach was also supposed to work with head Odjie Mamon and Brazilian Jorge Edson Souza in the national women’s team, which is training inside a bubble environment in Batangas, but chose to return home.
Thailand, which had kept a relatively flat line since the start of the pandemic, is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 infections with cases reaching 20,515 on Wednesday.
Liao said that Bundit was permitted to fly to Thailand after turning in a negative RT-PCR test.
He added that the former Ateneo coach was already inoculated with his first dose of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in Taguig and he could receive the second in Thailand.