The Philippines added six gold medals and moved to fourth place in the table, with the men’s gymnastics team contributing heavily.
Carlos Yulo ruled the men’s parallel bars as expected, but John Ivan Cruz and Juancho Besana showed their class in the floor exercise and vault as well.
Yulo was untouchable in the parallel bars, his score of 14.85 comfortably ahead of silver medalist Dinh Phương Thành of Vietnam (14.40).
Meanwhile, Cruz ensured that the floor exercise gold would stay with the Philippines as he topped the apparatus with a score of 13.85, beating Thailand’s Tikumporn Surintornta (13.80). Yulo ruled the event in Hanoi last year.
In vault, Besana’s total of 14.27 was good enough to relegate Surintornta (14.15) to another silver. Yulo was also the gold medalist in vault in the previous SEA Games, but the host nation ruled that non-Cambodian athletes can only compete in two apparatus finals this year.
Yulo thus concluded his campaign in Cambodia with two golds (parallel bars and individual all-around) and two silvers (team and still rings).
The soft tennis team scored a second gold as well, this time in the women’s team event after an impressive sweep of Indonesia in the final.
The Philippines ended with 25 gold medals, 39 silvers, and 42 bronzes on Tuesday, May 9 － good for fourth place in the medal table. Thailand is now at the top spot with 40-30-45, followed by Vietnam at 39-39-46. Host Cambodia slipped to third with a 39-39-39 haul.
Meanwhile, Gilas Pilipinas cruised to a 94-49 victory over Malaysia to open their quest for redemption. De La Salle University’s Michael Phillips threw down a handful of dunks to punctuate the Philippines’ win.
Also triumphant was the Philippine women’s volleyball team, who recorded a quick 25-5, 25-5, 25-5 over Cambodia at the jampacked Olympic Complex Indoor Main Hall.
However, the Philippine women’s football team － tipped to contend for gold － bowed out in the group stage despite inflicting a 2-1 defeat on defending champion Vietnam. Because of an inferior goal difference, the Filipinas will not make it to the semifinals. (ABS-CBN News)