IT will be the first time that Foton will be tasked to represent the country in next year’s staging of the Asian Volleyball Confederation Club Championship in Manila, with the Tornadoes earning the privilege after winning the recent Philippine Superliga Grand Prix tournament against defending champion Petron.
And if not for the fact that Petron’s superstar player Dindin Santiago Manabat is pregnant, she could be playing with sister Jaja, a mainstay of Foton, in that international tournament, according to Tornadoes’ team manager Alvin Lu.
“Last year, Petron played in the same tournament and we know, Petron is already a very strong team, but the opposition there was much stronger and they could not make much headway. So looking ahead to next year, we already requested the other PSL teams to lend us some of their players as reinforcements. After all, we are not just carrying Foton, but the country as well in the tournament. And Dindin was on top of our list. Now, we have to look for other big players. What is good is that the other teams have already agreed to our request,” said Lu at a recent victory party of the Foton Tornadoes for its Blue Army supporters at the company office in Caloocan.
What he is not sure of is who would be Foton’s imports for that tournament.
“Lindsay (Stalzer, the MVP at the PSL Grand Prix ) and Katie (Messing) have yet to finalize their own plans where to play next year and we still do not know of their availability. Our coaching staff will make its own recommendation based on what the team needs. We will hold invitational tryouts early next year as we will have some players on the present team who will not be available next year,” added Lu.
But one thing is definite, the Foton Tornadoes are looking to repeat its championship run in 2016.
“The pressure will be bigger because we already have won and all the other teams will be there trying to take that away from us,” said Foton head coach Vilet Ponce de Leon.