Protests

One kid’s great showing in the SunStar Football Cup was foiled when he was forced to sit out most of the P6 finals after the losing semifinalist questioned his eligibility since they saw him playing in the Players 8 division.

The Einstein Mighty Geeks filed the protest against University of San Jose-Recoletos (USJ-R) Balamban, and since the USJ-R coach failed-to include the players credentials--the ID he provided didn’t show the date of birth--we made a call to not let him play until they could provide what the other team was asking.

I thought that was the last of it but the Einstein coach came running back and asked why the whole team wasn’t disqualified and Neil Montesclaros, who heads the technical side of the tournament, said it aptly for us, “You want us to punish the whole team for this?”

Eventually, Neil managed to convinced him that it would be unfair to punish the whole team since it was obvious the guy was playing in the right age group and the mother was scampering to get a copy of that much-needed document.

That incident got me thinking that for next year, we are going to charge a protest fee of P1,000 per player, which would be non-refundable. I’ve been around tournaments for a while and in the past few years, there have been no age cheating incidents. Coaches who did in the past were banned and right now, it simply isn’t worth it.

Curiously, it was the third time I encountered a protest by Einstein and in all three instances, they were wrong. But in all three instances, the poor kid they protested against was left wondering what his fault was and why was he being singled out. In last Saturday’s case, the kid was reduced to tears as he watched his P6 finals being played with him stuck in the organizers’ table.

To be honest, while teams have a right to protest, I don’t like teams who seek to overturn a win via protest. Most of the veteran coaches I know don’t do that. They only file a protest if they know one player is clearly overaged because of direct knowledge (I coached when he was 12, why is he playing in the U11?)

I hope the next time Einstein loses, the team and its supporters learn to accept it and won’t resort to filing a protest because it leaves a bad taste in the mouth for the other side. Losing is part of a footballer’s journey and everyone loses at one point.

It’s how you deal with it that is important.