When Shaq delos Santos received an invitation to coach the women's volleyball national team, he did not hesitate to accept the offer.
The Petron mentor, however, made sure to ask first about the status of previously-appointed coach Ramil de Jesus before taking the job.
"Everybody knows that he was the coach. I was told that he asked for permission not to continue. For me, it was really important that the situation was clear before I start," explained Delos Santos, who will have Kungfu Reyes and Brian Esquibel as his assistant coaches.
Larong Volleyball sa Pilipinas, Inc. (LVPI) acting president Peter Cayco confirmed that De Jesus, who already held tryouts for national team hopefuls back in April, resigned from the post due to his commitments with La Salle and F2 Logistics.
Delos Santos was tapped by the LVPI to replace De Jesus and form a competitive team that will see action in the 2019 Southeast Asian Games to be held in the Philippines. He will also be in charge of the team that will compete Asian Games in Indonesia and Asian Women's Volleyball Cup in Thailand later this year.
The former Far Eastern University coach has won championships both in the UAAP and PSL. Despite his own impressive credentials, he knows that his appointment in place of a legendary tactician like De Jesus will be met by negative reactions and criticisms.
"When I accepted this job, I knew that it's part of the package. I've accepted that, there's no problem with that. I don't need to be down, I just need to make it an inspiration," Delos Santos said about dealing with bashers.
"For me, there's no need to compare. Only two things will happen, some will like it, some will not," he continued. "Based on my experience, why would you look for someone who's not there? You won't be able to move on if you keep on looking for something that you don't have or if you don't face your current situation."
Delos Santos would rather focus on the important task at hand and the first part of his agenda is to form a pool composed of 18 members. From there, the final lineup for the Asian Games, which needs to be submitted by June 10, will be determined.
Sixteen players including national team veterans such as Jaja Santiago, Mika Reyes, Aby Maraño, Kim Fajardo, and Denden Lazaro showed up in the initial meeting set by the LVPI last Tuesday to formally introduce the new tactician. More are expected to attend when the team starts training on Thursday.