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RP out of step with a football-crazy world


In much of the Philippines, football is identified more with private schools, while basketball rules the Filipino sports universe, with the occasional interruption for a Manny Pacquiao fight.

The Philippines' Rene Bretana (left) tries to keep the ball away from Sudan's Omar Berhan (center) and Behetin Alhabib during their game in the World Cup Pilipinas at the CCP grounds. GMANews.TV
That's probably the reason the typical kanto baller thinks football is for rich kids. That's not how the rest of the world thinks, according to former Philippine national team coach Hans Smit, an Indonesian citizen with roots in Holland, a world football power. This month many of the world's best players have converged in South Africa for the World Cup. More than a few used their football skills to escape poverty in their homelands. Smit said the tag of football as an "elite sport" is a misconception and Filipinos should stop calling it that since he believes this is one game where impoverished athletes of small physical stature can still excel. "Football is not for the elite or the rich. Pele, the greatest football player in the world, started in the streets before moving into more organized football schools," said Smit, who is currently the head coach of the La Salle women's football team. Pele went on to win three World Cup titles while playing for Brazil. While exclusive schools have among the best football programs and coaching, some efforts to encourage the sport among the poor have yielded surprising results. A Philippine youth team composed of former street kids early this year won the Shield Trophy in the Deloitte Street Child World Cup indoor football tournament in Durban, South Africa early this year.

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The Philippine team, underdogs in the tournament, even stunned football powerhouse and No. 2 ranked Brazil, 6-2. Football advocates are trying other ways to spread football from elite fields to public spaces. World Cup Pilipinas is a weekly league played at the CCP grounds organized by Sunken Garden United, a football club composed of UP alumni. TJ Besa, one of the organizers of World Cup Pilipinas, said that a tricycle driver is playing for one of the teams in the league. "He (tricycle driver) just came and asked if he can play with us. Our doors are open to anyone. Even to people who do not know how to play football. Football is a Filipino sport. It is a big sport and it needs believers for it to grow. We just need to work together." While our basketball-crazy nation religiously follows the NBA finals this month, a minority of sports fans will be staying up late to watch the World Cup matches live on local television. South Africa has a seven-hour time differential in Manila. Smit said football would be a much bigger sport in the Philippines if youth programs were sustained and national football officials set aside the politics that has plagued the sport since he started coaching in 1979. "If you ask me, there's no (football) program," Smit said. "They should have continued the youth teams that I handled before. It’s hard to get it off the ground here. How to do it properly without politics and anything else, just pure football development. Everybody has plans, people start off with something but it always changes."

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. Smit has coached the men's, women's, boys' and girls' Philippine national football teams, including a Futsal squad. "It's going to be difficult. Our football leaders need to have political will and continue with various programs for development. We need to act now. Hopefully, we can see changes with Noynoy (Aquino) winning." The problems that have held back football's development in the Philippines have not stopped younger advocates from organizing new efforts. Philip Hagedorn of the Football Alliance-organized LBC-United Football League said there are many established clubs in the Visayas and Mindanao, one reason why he believes that there is room for football to grow along with basketball. "Football is growing especially at the youth level, and being a World Cup year we hope that every game sparks interest," Hagedorn said. – HS, GMANews.TV
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