by Ashley Bercasio
Philippine women’s national football team head coach Alen Stajcic hopes that the Filipinas’ historic title win of the 2022 ASEAN Football Federation (AFF) Women’s Championship will spark the growth of football in the Philippines.
There were more than 8,000 Filipino football fans who attended the game on Sunday, July 17, at the Rizal Memorial Stadium, witnessing the Filipinas’ first-ever international championship following a 3-0 beating of Thailand in the finals.
“It’s amazing to see the fans come out and lift Philippine football and bring it to life, it’s just truly spectacular,” Stajcic said.
Stajcic pleaded for more support from Filipino fans on July 4, following the national squad’s stunning 1-0 victory over his former team Australia.
From there, crowd attendance steadily increased as the Filipinas raked on win after the other. That included wins over Singapore (7-0), Malaysia (4-0) and Indonesia (4-1) before the Philippines bowed to Thailand, 0-1, in their final group stage game.
The Philippines would blast reigning champions Vietnam in the semifinals, 4-0, setting up a rematch with the the Thais in the final.
“To see the crowd come alive and Filipino football come alive is just a truly transforming moment, hopefully, for the sport,” Stajcic remarked.
“Have few more people fall in love with the sport, wanna play the sport, wanna come watch the sport and the sport can grow and be the number one sport in this country like it is in the rest of the world.”
Since Stajcic’s installment as head coach in October 2021, the national women’s squad enjoyed an upward trajectory. This included reaching the semifinals of the 2022 AFC Women’s Asian Cup back in January, capturing the country’s first-ever FIFA Women’s World Cup slot.
The Filipinas also ended their 37-year medal drought in the Southeast Asian Games, salvaging the bronze medal following a 2-1 rout of Myanmar in the 31st edition held in Vietnam last May.
“It’s miraculous what these players have done in the last two weeks, let alone in the last four weeks,” said Stajcic.
“Ten games in 27, 28 days, we’ve won eight, lost two, the two we lost on one-nil, things just keep getting better and better, to be able to play like that, after seven games in 14 days, I can’t have words to describe how resilient and mentally tough they are. The players obviously deserve all the credit.”
With the Filipinas finally conquering the Southeast Asian region, Stajcic is already looking towards the next challenge.
“We’ve conquered the hill, big hill in Southeast Asia, and showed that we can be champions in Southeast Asia but there are still mountains that lie ahead, we’ve got some big big big challenges lying ahead to conquer the rest of Asia and the World Cup next year,” said the 48-year-old Stajcic.
Stajcic and the vastly-improved Filipinas will show their wares against 31 other teams in the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup scheduled from July 20-August 20, 2023 in Australia and New Zealand. – bny
