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Galeries Tower coach Lerma Giron during a press conference. Photo from Galeries

MANILA, Philippines — The Galeries Tower Highrisers may be the newest team in the Premier Volleyball League (PVL) but they promise to be a hard-fighting team in the All-Filipino Conference. 

Galeries coach Lerma Giron stressed that the Highrisers entered the PVL not just to participate but to win games against the 11 other clubs.

‘We are the youngest, the baby of the PVL for this conference. But this baby will fight. The goal is of course build this team with our talented players and make them as one as much as possible despite the very short span of time that we’re together,” said Giron in Filipino in a press conference on Saturday at Okada.

“We’ll try to win one game at a time. We will utilize and optimize the talents of these players and the coaching staff.”

Giron is thrilled to become the second female coach in the pros, joining F2 Logistics coach Regine Diego.

“Girl power! Actually, we were seated together during the press conference and talked about girl power. I’m very privileged to be one of the few women coaches in the PVL,” the Galeries coach said.

Diego, who will coach her third PVL conference, welcomed Giron as she hopes to have more female coaches in the league.

“That’s our goal to have more women in this industry. Hopefully, next time more women will be here,” Diego said.

Graze Bombita, who suffered an ACL injury during Cignal’s warmup in the All-Filipino Conference last year, will be making her return when she teams up with skipper Fhen Emnas and pro debutant Dimdim Pacres.

Completing the Highrisers are Carly Hernandez, Ysa Jimenez, Norielle Ipac, Rap Aguilar, Kia Melgar, Acy Masangkay, Roma Doromal, Julia Angeles, Juliet Catindig, Anne Esguerra, and Andrea Marzan.

For captain Emnas, it’s not hard to get along with her teammates, some of whom were her former teammates and batchmates and have already experienced playing in the pros.

“It’s not hard for us to work together because some of us were former teammates and we’re batchmates. Everyone is working hard on and off the court to build our chemistry,” said Emnas in Filipino.

Galeries Tower will open its PVL campaign against Petro Gazz on Tuesday, 7 p.m., at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

Assistant coach Godfrey Okumu, who is returning to the PVL for the first time since coaching Motolite in 2019, is trusting the process of their young team, which expressed its long-time commitment to the league.

“What we expect as a team or as coaches, we believe in progress and then as we continue working on progress, that’s (what) I’m looking at the team looking forward,” said Okumu. “So yes, we will have wins. Yes, we might have losses but it’s part of the game. So it’s not about (just) participating, it’s really going out there and giving their all. We’re a young team but we’re strong and (we have) heart and we’re ready to go. Even though in the PVL we expect challenges, nothing comes easy so we just have to go and fight.”