Rough sailing ahead

Alas Pilipinas men’s team head coach Angiolino Frigoni was far from satisfied despite his squad’s impressive performance in a clean three-game sweep of the Alas Pilipinas Invitationals.

The strict Italian coach had no time to celebrate the Filipinos’ successful homestand against clubs from South Korea and Indonesia and the national squad of regional powerhouse Thailand in the short tilt held at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

For the 71-year-old decorated tactician, Alas will still need to up the ante if it wants to compete against the best international teams heading to the Philippines for the country’s hosting of the FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship 2025 from 12 to 28 September.

“You know, did you hear my interview before that I said that for us it’s not important to win or to lose because for these matches we can get information by statistics, by emotion, to see if the players are good enough to compete and what we have to improve on,” he said.

“Okay, we are very happy of course that we win, right? But for us, it doesn’t mean anything. The trip to the World Championship and the Asian Games is very long. So, we take this as a good start.”

Frigoni, of course, doesn’t want to dampen Alas’ euphoria after a great Invitationals run that saw the Marck Espejo and Owa Retamar-led squad closing the event with a victorious five-set thriller over the Thais, 21-25, 25-21, 25-22, 21-25, 15-12.

Alas also scored four-set wins over South Korean club Hyundai Capital Skywalkers and Indonesian pro league champion Jakarta Bhayangkara Presisi.

He just wanted his team to temper expectations with much tougher battles ahead, especially with just three months left before the World Championship.

“I don’t know if we have enough time. We will do our best to be good there. You know which ranking you are in the world, right?” Frigoni said, reiterating World No. 59 Alas is in for a tough grind.

Alas is in Pool A, along with World No. 16 Iran, No. 22 Egypt and No. 39 Tunisia. Only the top two teams in each of the eight pools in the group stage will advance to the Round of 16 of the competition led by defending champion Italy.

“We are going to compete against Iran in the World Championship, against Egypt that I know very well because I was coaching there a long time ago,” Frigoni said.

“And again Tunisia. So, they are on another level of ranking and in another level of volleyball. But I think that we can be close to them because last year we were also far from (the level of) Thailand.”

Alas Pilipinas’ focus now shifts to the Asian Volleyball Confederation Men’s Volleyball Nations Cup, which kicks off on Tuesday in Bahrain.

There, the Philippines will have an early rematch with Thailand, while Kazakhstan and New Zealand are also in the same pool.