Dubai: Australia’s basketball team haven’t ruled out filing assault charges against Philippines players after a FIBA World Cup Asian qualifier between the two countries descended into a mass brawl in Bulacan on Monday.
A total of 13 players (nine from the Philippines and four from Australia) were ejected after the fight, which occurred towards the end of the third quarter with Australia leading 79-48.
Incredibly, the game continued despite the Philippines only having three players left on court, while Australia still had eight to choose from.
Australia eventually won the game 89-53.
All-out riot
The chaos erupted when the Philippines’ RR Pogoy reciprocated Christopher Goulding’s shove sending the Australian to the ground, this then prompted Australia’s Daniel Kickert to elbow Pogoy in the face, sparking an all-out riot with fans and officials even getting involved.
Philippines coach Chot Reyes defended his side’s actions and pinned the blame on Kickert, who he said had been looking for trouble from the offset.
“It’s absolutely unacceptable but the reality is that (Daniel) Kickert [was] hitting our players during the warm-ups.
“So when he did that, the foul of Pogoy on Goulding was an offensive foul, it was a basketball play, but he (Kickert) was the one who came in and decked Pogoy.
Five times
“You don’t expect to do it to a team five times (counting warm-up scraps) and not expect them to retaliate.”
Goulding’s agent Dan Moldovan hasn’t ruled out taking legal action in defence of his client but is first waiting to see what FIBA’s response will be.
“To see not a single security guard step in and protect anybody is hard for me to even fathom,” he said.
“I have to see what FIBA does. If FIBA’s response isn’t adequate, I’m going to pursue my own legal avenues to protect my client. Serious measures need to be put in place before I comfortably send players to these environments again.”
Basketball Australia chief Anthony Moore also apologised for his team’s part in the brawl but likewise didn’t rule out legal action.
“While we accept responsibility for our role in last night’s incident, what we don’t accept is the actions whereby fans and officials actually get involved in the fray. We’ve also got a fan throwing a chair at one of our players.
“So, we absolutely find that unacceptable, and while we’ll be waiting for FIBA to provide us with their fines and sanctions, that’s certainly an issue we will be addressing with FIBA.
Premature
“It’s premature for us to comment at this stage,” Moore added of legal action. “We want to work with FIBA and the tribunal to get that outcome and then we’ll assess our options from there.
"We have briefed our lawyers on that as you would expect us to do as a national federation on a matter like this but that’s something we’ll address in the fullness of time.”
Less quotes concerning legal action have been coming out of the Philippines camp but Filipino senators have largely defended their team, and a spokesman for President Rodrigo Duterte called the “regretful incident” something the Philippines has to be “sorry for”.
The brawl threatens to put the Philippines co-hosting of the 2023 FIBA World Cup along with Indonesia and Japan into question, particularly when it comes to security measures.
