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Source: Manila Bulletin

-- For the second straight time the Philippines will have a lone participant in the boxing competitions of the Olympic Games, one more sad commentary on the state of the sport in the Philippines.

After the heavily-funded, five-man team got wiped out in the last Olympic qualifying event in Kazakhstan, the country will just have light-flyweight Mark Anthony Barriga to carry the hopes and dreams of the entire nation to win a medal in London.

Charly Suarez could have joined Barriga in the Olympics, but lost in the lightweight gold medal match against China’s Liu Qiang Thursday night, sending a chill to boxing fans and officials.

Despite the support given by PLDT-Smart, Barriga will be the only guy everyone will be looking at to carry the torch for the country.

But even his participation is tinge with skepticism. He was named the so-called “lucky loser” and advanced to the London Games after his quarterfinal opponent went on to win the gold medal in the 2011 World Boxing Championships.

Had Zou Shiming, the gold medalist, lost in the semis or finals, Barriga would have also become history.

But now, he has a chance at redemption, though.

His handlers, the Amateur Boxing Association of the Philippines, said it will pull all the stops to give Barriga the equipment and support, be it financial, mental and psychological, to make his London Games experience end in joy and achievement.

Barriga as lone Filipino boxer in the Olympics marks the second straight time that the country just has one fighter in the Games, duplicating the country’s 2008 Beijing Games campaign when light-fly Harry Tañamor was all by himself and lost in his first assignment.

Before 2008, the last time the Philippines had just one fighter was in the 1960 Rome Olympics with Segundo Macalalad as its representative in the flyweight class. After drawing a bye in the first round, Macalalad lost in the second round of eliminations.

The Philippines has never fielded less than three fighters to the Olympics and boxing has actually contributed five medals (two silvers and three bronzes) of the total nine won in the last 80 years.

Two boxing personalities – Tony Aldeguer of Cebu and Manny Piñol of North Cotabato – were not surprised with the misfortune that struck Philippine boxing.

“Nothing has changed and I don’t think there ever will be,” said Aldeguer, whose boxing factory in Cebu is a known producer of talent.

Piñol, whose obsession with uplifting the state of amateur boxing even saw him land in Cuba six years ago, said the current leadership has no concrete and solid grassroots program.

Piñol has become so exasperated that he has dissolved his amateur stable.

“Once my boxers turn 17 (years old), they turn pro,” said Piñol, who, like Aldeguer, has a vast stable of pros.

Philippine Olympic Committee spokesperson Joey Romasanta said he is not upbeat about the Philippines’ chances in London.

He said, in effect, that failing to make the Olympics on actual merit would make it difficult to win a medal.

“But we are hoping against hope,” he said.