Yes either way it will be very tough, but less tough than if we got anyone from Group B! Right now the team appears to be a complete mystery but i heard the federation might plan to contact North Korea or Myanmar for friendlies early next year.
I'd say your ladies Dernhelm will need those friendly games. Only 9 international matches played by Philippines this year while Jordan has played 15 of them in 2017 and has your other rivals -Thailand (12 matches so far) on the menu for tommorow.
The plan right now actually is an intensive camp in the US starting later this month because majority of the squad will be US-based. The camp itself will have tuneup games with American women's clubs and perhaps a team from Puerto Rico i heard or the Mexican WNT. Then after the intensive camp will be friendlies with Asian nations. Yes i know we're cramming that a team really hasn't been formed yet at this point while retaining only a few (half?) from the players this year but trust me when i say this is a lot better than the normal arrangement of preparing only two months before the tournament.
Well, what I'd say is that, on paper, it still remains nothing more than a dream (especially given the results of latest South Asian Championship). Now, at least, it's a dream that has some slight chances of becoming true. if Philippines had ended in group B instead of Vietnam, there would have been no actual dream to talk about...
Yes you are right, either way it's still a tough and we are definitely the underdogs made obvious by our ranking. But it's been made "less tough" by being in Group A. We have to figure out how to beat Jordan and Thailand to make things more promising. Anyway don't forget we lost only 0-1 to Thailand in a previous qualifier and in the SEA Games where we supposedly underperformed, we had our best game vs Thailand losing 1-3. Thailand meanwhile beat Jordan 3-0. We hope to turn around that 1-5 loss to Jordan in the recent qualifiers, i mean the Jordan coach expects us to be much improved by then. We shall see!
Not many warm up to it though, there's a negative connotation to it that is frowned upon by other women here particularly the coaches, players and the parents of the younger players. There's also Malditas vs Matildas oh dear
Since i apparently am not allowed to write news articles for TBT anymore, will post the press releases straight here instead And btw... HAPPY HOLIDAYS from the Philippine teams!
AWESOME!! A female player has been chosen as the Philippine football player of the Year by a media outlet probably for the first time ever!! https://www.rappler.com/sports/by-sport/football/192349-2017-pinoy-football-awards And it's none other than Sara Castañeda https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1733933636651569
I especially like the final credits, stating that editing, video and photos were due, among others, especially to Mia Montayre!
Woot, i got some of the girls featured on the AFC site http://www.the-afc.com/competitions.../news/philippines-prepare-for-shot-at-history
Are the photos made by you? You didn't talk to us much about new coach: what his plan is? What kind of approach does he want to take? Also, how the seclection process for the Jordan team is going on? What's more likely? That the core of the "old" team who qualified remains or that there will be many new insertions of American-Pilipino girls?
Yep, the photos are mine hehe. I haven't really met the entire staff yet or have i personally seen his approach/system. All he said to me back then regarding systems was that: The selection process was unique in our case. There were two parts... Philippine based Filipinas and overseas-based Filipinas. For the former, the PFF technical director made the call-ups. For the latter, an identification camp and tryouts was held. What's not just likely but is happening is that there will be many insertions of Filipino-Americans. I mean you said it yourself or someone @Lechus7 maybe in the Nadeshiko thread that with the previous team we had in Tajikistan is not going to work or won't be enough to stand against the 7 other best teams in Asia. So this is our level up. Hopefully... it will work, a bit.
Could work indeed, but there is not much time to integrate these new players in the old team and to elaborate a "best system" to support them all...
Hmm...outside of training camps, a full run in mini-tournament around March would do the job of team integration nicely. Something akin to Istria Cup or Gold City Cup. Perhaps some local venue? Heh, I know easier said than done but... oh well you know the saying the more you have...
I think that is planned. Something like friendlies against teams or clubs in the Southern US or Mexico even. And they say they are talking to Japan for a friendly or North Korea.
Judging from two consecutive posts by @BostonRed on the "Yank Women on Foreign WNT" thread, the "big scrimmage" through friendlies vs clubs to sift through all of the US-based Pilipinas already began! Two teams were tried, both with almost American-born girls only! These are very interesting news. Actually, Japan especially needs friendlies vs higher-ranked teams, but in fact they anyway need more friendlies in general, so let us know if the contacts with Japanese Federation will have any positive outcome. Edit: it could be a chance for you to photograph both your girls and Japanese players!
Oh yeah tell me about it, sorely missed out already when they had a training camp in Japan and got to tuneup with Nojima Stella.