Team Rebisco and Team Choco Mucho. PHIL VOLLEYBALL PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—Team Choco Mucho’s first game in the 2021 Asian Women’s Volleyball Club Championship will be played with a slightly different roster after Mary Joy Baron and Kianna Dy got switched to Team Rebisco.
Thai news organization SMM also reported about the change of players with the tournament’s list of players posted on its Facebook page.
Team Choco Mucho will play in the tournament opener against Nakhon Ratchasima Qmin VC on Friday without Dy and Baron.
Rebisco will also play its first game on Friday at 6 pm (Bangkok time) against Kazakh squad Altay.
Philippine coach Odjie Mamon and consultant Jorge Edson Souza de Brito decided to move Dy and Baron to Rebisco after four of the team’s players were mandated to complete additional local health and safety protocols.
Team Rebisco and Team Choco Mucho are en route to Nakhon Ratchasima 🇹🇭 to represent the Philippines 🇵🇭 at the 2021 AVC Women’s Club Volleyball Championship on October 1-7.
Special thanks to Rebisco, Philippine Sports Commission and Taguig. pic.twitter.com/GgerI0a0tF
— Volleyball Philippines (@volleyball_phi) September 28, 2021
Ramon “Tats” Suzara, president of the Philippine National Volleyball Federation, said the four players’ swab tests “weren’t immediately cleared” as the results were brought to Bangkok, where the main lab of the Thai Department of Disease Control is located.
The AVC has also approved the players’ transfer.
Suzara said that a team cannot have just eight players for the tournament as it will be too grueling for such a small roster.
“You cannot have only eight players on a team which is bound to play so many number of matches,” said Suzara. “It’s a sound decision to balance the team—besides, all of the athletes in Thailand are members of the national team.”
The two Philippine teams arrived in Bangkok around midnight on Tuesday and traveled by bus 400 kilometers north of the Thai capital to the Nakhon Ratchasima.