Yee Chun Leong
BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN
Picture: Courtesy of FIBA
DEFENDING Champions YTE have roped in the services of Filipino Federico Samson to coach them for the upcoming YOU.C1000 Cup.
Samson is coming off coaching the Thailand women’s team at the FIBA Under-19 World Cup last month.
He had previously coached the Vietnam national team at the 2011 SEA Games in Indonesia.
During his playing career, Samson was part of the youth team that won the SEABA Championship as well as the Asian Championships in 1998.
Samuel Jong, the playing owner of YTE, believes that the seasoned Filipino coach will be a big plus for the team.
“Unfortunately we couldn’t find a suitable coach locally so we decided to bring in an overseas coach,” said Jong in an interview with BruSports News recently.
“He may bring new experience and knowledge into our system and something different to Brunei Basketball,” he added.
YTE are drawn in Group A together with Fitness Zone - Juramas, Setia Builders, Yuniku and Moldex Realty in Phase 1 of the competition - which doesn’t allow imports (players without Brunei identity card).
“Without import in the first phase of this tournament I think every team has a chance to win it. We look forward to a competitive tournament,” said Jong.
“As much as we want to defend our championship from last year, we will try our best to make it to the final four first and hopefully retain the championship,” added the forward.
“There are a lot of good teams this year and we will try our best to go back-to-back,” he concluded.
The squad include Filpinos Don Mordeno, Elvin Requintin, Megallon, Macasero, Eric Palanca and Matthew Jerickson.
Ting Heng Lee, Tony Bong, Lim Liang Wei, Kenny Lim, Andy Lin and Eric Ho complete the rest of the roster.
The YOU.C1000 Cup is scheduled to tip off on Friday with two games starting from 6.45pm onwards.
