Australia & Phillippines Basketball Game Turns Into Brawl

Zoe Taylor · Jul 02, 2018

Australia's FIBA World Cup qualifying game with the Philippines in Bulacan has been abandoned early after a huge brawl erupted between the teams. 13 players were ejected from the game after the fight during the third quarter between the two teams and some fans.

The fight began after Philippines guard Roger Ray Pogoy elbowed Australia's Chris Goulding. When Daniel Kickert retaliated, the brawl ensued with even a chair being included in the fight.

Although the game was paused for over 30 minutes, there is a rule that all games must continue unless a team only has a single player available, meaning the Philippines had three players against five Australians. They eventually fouled themselves out.

Anthony Moore, Basketball Australia CEO said: "Basketball Australia deeply regrets the incident in tonight's match between the Boomers and the Philippines in Manila. We are extremely disappointed with what happened and our role in it."

Boomers team have confirmed all team are safe and well. More updates to come this morning.
— Basketball Australia (@BasketballAus) 2 July 2018

"This is not the spirit in which sport should be played and certainly not in the spirit in which we aim to play basketball. We apologise to our fans and will await the penalties to be handed down."

The International Basketball Federation said: "Following the incident that occurred in the third quarter of the Philippines-Australia game on Monday in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 Asian Qualifiers, FIBA will now open disciplinary proceedings against both teams. The decision(s) will be communicated in the coming days."

Chot Reyes, coach for the Phillippines, said "[This is] absolutely unacceptable but the reality is Kickert was hitting our players during the warm ups. He hit Carl Bryan Cruz, he hit Matthew Wright, he hit Pogoy and he hit Calvin Abueva during the warm ups. The foul of Pogoy on Goulding was called an offensive foul, it was a basketball play, but he was the one that came in and decked Pogoy for the fifth time. You cannot expect to do that to a team five times and not expect [there] to be retaliation. That's what happened and unfortunately, that's what has triggered the entire brawl."