Monday, February 21, 2011

Azkals hold training camp in Baguio and Japan

This appears in the Monday February 21, 2010 edition of the Business Mirror.

Azkals hold training camp in Baguio and Japan
by rick olivares

The Philippine Men’s National Football Team left for Baguio City yesterday to prepare for their upcoming AFC Challenge Cup away match with Mongolia on March 15. In an interview with national coach Hans Michael Weiss in Bacolod City, the German said that the cold weather conditions of the City of Pines is part of the strategy to acclimatize the team to the cold weather conditions of Ulan Bataar.

The Philippines could be missing the services of starting keeper Neil Etheridge and defender Rob Gier for the Mongolia leg. Etheridge’s English Premier League team, Fulham, is currently in 12th place of the 20-team league with a 6-win, 13-draw, 8-loss record. Gier in the meantime has his construction business that needs looking after. Weiss will promote two players from the 30-man national pool to replace the two Fil-Britons.

The training camp of the Azkals up north is sponsored by the Baguio Football Association and the Baguio Country Club.

The team will train there until February 26 before they fly to Japan for further training under the auspices of the Japan Football Association. The Filipinos will be staying at the J-Village, the national training facility in Fukushima. The J-Village is where the Blue Samurai, as Japan’s national team is known by, trained for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and their campaign in the last Asian Cup in which they won 1-0 over Australia.

The Philippine National Team flies to Mongolia on March 13.

5 comments:

  1. cjeagleFebruary 21, 2011 at 12:27 AM

    Hope they get a tuneup match against a Japanese team while they are in Japan. The Japanese are technically sound and it would be a good experience for them.

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  2. AnonymousFebruary 21, 2011 at 9:45 AM

    You are using the wrong sports terminology to describe football. ' Bleachers' is an American term. We call them the Stands in football.

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  3. Rick OlivaresFebruary 21, 2011 at 10:02 AM

    Where in the story did I use "bleachers"? If you are referring to the name of my blog -- that's the name. So don't give me any terminology crap. The Stands. Jeezus. Are you British?

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousFebruary 21, 2011 at 1:13 PM

    lol! youre right Rick! read naman muna the content before ka mag comment. ayan tuloy....

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousFebruary 22, 2011 at 10:06 PM

    Why would Fulham need Ethridge, unless they plan to make him starting goalie in some games (which would be awesome)?

    ReplyDelete