AIR21 will most likely keep its temperamental head coach Yeng Guiao for the rest of the 2010-11 season of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA).

Guiao’s contract will expire at the end of the year but team manager Allan Gregorio will recommend that he stays with a “retooled” Express team which finished seventh in the Philippine Cup.

“I don’t think it will be fair to evaluate coach Yeng just for only one conference considering the number of new players [in] the team,” said Gregorio. “My recommendation [is] for him is to stay at least the rest of the season and then we will evaluate him.”

Guiao joined the Bert Lina franchise midway of the 2008-09 season after a four-title run with Red Bull team (now Barako Bull).

Under Guiao, some marquee names at Air21 were traded like JC Intal (Ginebra), Cyrus Baguio (Ginebra), Arwind Santos (San Miguel Beer) and Japeth Aguilar (Talk ’N Text).

The Express opened the season with a lot of promise as they cornered the top three picks in the draft in Nonoy Baclao, Rabeh Al-Hussaini and Rey Guevarra.

But Air21 barely made it to the quarterfinal round and finished seventh after the elimination phase before being booted out by San Miguel Beer. The Beermen held a twice-to-beat edge in their quarterfinal matchup.

Guiao said no one from Air21 management has contacted him so far regarding his status with the franchise.

“No one has approached me yet and that’s keeping me thinking if they are still interested or not,” said Guiao, also the vice governor of Pampanga.

“My concern really is the team because we have developed some sort of improvement and the players are beginning to adjust to the style of play that I want,” he added.

Since entering the league in 2002, the Express have yet to win a PBA crown. The best they could muster was a runner-up finish to Barangay Ginebra in the 2008 Fiesta Conference finals in a classic seven games. Air21 led that series, 3-2, but the Kings won the next two games.

Joel Orellana, Business Mirror