Two-time world champion Gerry Peñalosa feels the Association of Boxing Alliances in the Philippines (ABAP) could be missing out on talented fighters he believes are just waiting to be tapped.

A former amateur star himself, Peñalosa believes the composition of the coaching staff remains rock-solid but the roster of boxers could be improved.

“There are very good fighters outside the national team. Cebu has a lot and in Mindanao there is also a lot of great talent as well,” said Peñalosa, who decided to turn pro after a controversial call during a high-level tournament in Manila.

“The coaches in the Philippine team are good. I admire them and I know them,” Peñalosa, now 52, said in the aftermath of the two bronze medals won by the Philippines in the Paris Olympics.

Only female punchers Nesthy Petecio and Aira Villegas made it to the podium as the rest of the five-man squad — Eumir Marcial and Carlo Paalam in the men’s and Hergie Bacyadan in the women’s — got eliminated early.

Marcial, bronze medalist in the previous Olympics in Tokyo, was stunned by Uzbekistan’s Turabek Khabibullaev while Paalam, a Tokyo silver medalist, was given a bad decision against Australia’s Charlie Senior and Bacyadan fell to Chinese top seed Li Qian.

Peñalosa admits there were a couple of bum decisions that struck the Philippine team but Paalam’s defeat was just too hard to accept.

“He won that fight,” Peñalosa, former super-flyweight and super-bantamweight titlist, said.

Despite boxing’s inability to match the Tokyo output of two silvers and one bronze, the sport remains an integral part of the Philippines’ Olympic medal haul, accounting for ten of the total 18 won.

All in all, boxing has produced four silvers and six bronzes.

There are also a wide variety of factors why an Olympic gold remains elusive to this day.

Talented, young boxers tend to turn pro as a short cut to fight poverty.

“Many boxers go pro to earn money right away. The Olympics, it’s every four years,” added Peñalosa.

If only there is a program that gives promising boxers the reason not to turn pro, then the hunt for the gold would have been over given the constant supply coming out of the assembly line by way of the regional competitions and the national level meets like the Palarong Pambansa.

Interestingly, many of the finest Filipino world champions today competed in the Palaro and other tournaments.

Then, there is also the subject of politics, something Peñalosa refused to dip his fingers on.

And that’s another story.