Philippine Olympic Committee President Abraham Tolentino said this yesterday after he revealed the number of sports disciplines that have been proposed for the 2021 Southeast Asian Games in Vietnam.
The figures and the venues are expected to be revealed and most likely finalized during a virtual meeting of the 11 South-east Asian Games Federation members on July 21.
POC Secretary-General attorney Edwin Gastanes said that this is the proposal that Vietnamese organizers gave them.
Gastanes expects member nations to appeal for the inclusion of other sports.
“That’s the proposal of Vietnam. I expect that other countries in the Asean will make some request or appeal for the inclusion of the other sports. It happens every SEA Games meeting just like with us,” said Gastanes.
There are a total of 56 events contested in the 30th SEA Games edition in the Philippines last year.
Tolentino revealed the reduced figures after joining the first SEA Games Council Federation online meeting last Thursday.
The list includes the two compulsory sports of athletics and aquatics, which has swimming and diving events.
There's also archery, badminton, basketball 5-on-5 and 3X3, boxing, billiards and snooker, canoe-kayak, chess, Xiangqui, cycling road and mountain bike.
Other sports mentioned were dancesports, fencing, football, futsal, golf, gymnastics’ artistic, rhythmic and aerobics, handball indoor and beach, judo, karate, muay, pencak silat and pétanque.
Also listed were rowing, sepak takraw, shooting’s pistol, rifle and shotgun, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, indoor volleyball, beach volleyball, weightlifting and wrestling’s greco roman and freestyle.
The events of finswimming, bodybuilding, wushu, kurash, kickboxing and Vietnam’s traditional sports vovinam were the other sports in the list as well.
“We are still finalizing what sports to appeal,” added Gastanes, who added the next SEAG Council Federation online meeting will be set on July 21.
The shortened sports proposal is the result of efforts to control the spread of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
