Cebu football is on the rise

CEBU, Philippines – The Cebu City Sports Center is a noisy and vibrant cauldron of football passion as the home side, Global Cebu, hosts FC Meralco Manila in a Saturday afternoon, September 16, Philippines Football League match.

There are a few banners and scarves as a mix of young and old cheer the team on. A throaty supporters group, the Ultras Sugbo, keeps on chanting and singing all throughout the game. Unfortunately the home fans settle for a goalless draw that leaves them stuck on seven points behind the league-leading Manileños.

The 4,850-strong attendance is impressive for a startup league still seeking a regular fan-base.  Many PFL games are played in front of just a few hundred spectators.  Previously Global had drawn almost 6000 in a match against Visayan rival Ceres. But what’s even more amazing is that those fans shelled out money for those tickets. Ceres and Davao, the other two teams that have big crowds in the PFL, allow fans to watch for free.

The cheapest ticket for the Global – Meralco game is P20, with P100 and P200 seats also available.

Cebu Football Association president Ricky Dakay mentioned a surprising fact about the tickets. “The more expensive tickets are the ones that sell out first.”

Such is life in the Visayan boomtown, where new office buildings pierce the sky seemingly every few months. But it isn’t just business that is on a roll. The town’s large middle class is also boosting football to new heights.

Right after the Global – Meralco game the 19^th Aboitiz Football Cup kicked off at the stadium. The Aboitiz has long been a staple of football in Cebu and it is growing from strength to strength. This year there will be around 4,000 participants representing over 130 teams in 19 categories, from age groups as young as U7, to girls and senior competitions. There is even an inter-BPO division.

The Aboitiz Football Cup is also an ongoing competition that takes months to finish. This is no one-off weekend festival but a continuous league with playoffs. Most of the age groups will be done by December but the men’s competitions could stretch until March, like last year’s event.

Starting at the U13 age group, all the play in the age groups to the seniors is 11-a-side, except for the BPO division. This is a huge advantage over other small-sided, 7-a-side competitions that do not teach the offside rule and do not emphasize the fitness required of a 90-minute match in a big field.

Since most of the CFA’s teams play in the Aboitiz, the event also serves as a general membership meeting of the FA.

The most remarkable aspect about Cebu football is the harmony within the group.  Dakay intentionally involved and included members of other factions in the leadership of the CFA, including those from the previous administration of Richard Montayre.

“There’s no more factionalism in Cebu football,” says veteran Cebu sportswriter Mike Limpag.

The CFA is also on the ball with its scheduling of competitions. According to Rico Navarro, Sacred Heart School athletic director and a CFA Vice President, the Aboitiz pauses for other big football events like the SunStar Cup and the Thirsty cup.

“Parang FIFA windows,” says Navarro of the scheduling system. The CFA scheduling also takes into consideration the Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc., or CESAFI. In this competition, the Queen City’s answer to the UAAP, there are five schools with football teams in both the senior and high school level. All of these tournaments are given time without conflicts from other competitions.

According to Jinggoy Roa, CFA liaison, the Association will not sanction an event unless they can find a proper date for it. This is in stark contrast to the situation in Metro Manila, where some competitions using the same players run concurrently. The Metro Manila set up sometimes cause conflicts between stakeholders.

The CFA also has a database of 11,000 registered players. No doubt there are even more unregistered ones. Having a database of players with their information helps avoid the age cheating that occasionally makes an appearance in Filipino youth sports.

There is also a healthy dose of futsal, or 5-a-side indoor football, in Cebu. Just a few weeks ago a second provincial futsal cup was held, comprised of 8 clubs in U15 and U18 age groups. Dakay says the popularity of the small-sided game has increased “overnight” in basketball courts all over the island.

And yet challenges remain. One of the biggest issues facing football in the province is a dearth of pitches. The Aboitiz Football Cup is using four grounds, the Cebu City Sports Complex, Don Bosco Technology Center, Sacred heart School-Ateneo De Cebu, and the pitch in PAREF Springdale school. The new pitch and stadium in the University of San Carlos is apparently not yet fit for use.

Last Sunday some U11 and U13 Aboitiz Cup matches were called off because of an unplayable pitch. The community could really use a regulation-sized artificial grass facility. At the moment the only synthetic pitch in Cebu city is the small-sided one owned by the Genco family.

Aboitiz is said to be developing a 400-hectare tract of land in Liloan, 20 kilometers northeast of the city, that will include two football fields. The Cebu-based company will also make a football facility in Lipa, Batangas as part of a retail complex there.

So yes, help is on the way, but it can’t come fast enough. The CCSC, also known as the Abellana Field will soon undergo what Limpag calls its “yearly death,” the Sinulog Festival. The annual event held in January usually leaves the field trashed and unsuitable for football for quite sometime. Since the CCSC is near the center of town and is very accessible by public transportation, the field is important to the growth of football in the city.

Global has played seven matches there in this PFL season, three of which have been goalless draws. While there is plenty of lush grass, there are still some bumpy areas. Perhaps the unpredictability of the surface bedevils attacking players and thus explains the paucity of scoring.

While Cebu has a very good infrastructure for youth football, there is a noticeable dearth of Cebuano players at the highest level. Two Cebuanos dressed for last Saturday’s game, but neither Global’s John Melgo nor Meralco’s Neil Dorimon checked into the game. Ceres has one Cebuano, goalie Louie Casas, but he is the backup to Roland Müller. Perhaps the Cebuano with the most regular playing time in the PFL is Stallion Laguna striker Dan Villarico.

Hopefully a bumper crop of promising young players like Ateneo’s Enzo Ceniza, DLSU’s Nicko Villacin, and NU’s Lawrence Colina will change that once they finish with the UAAP and turn pro.

“The CFA is one of the most active FAs in the country, and that’s the main reason why Global chose it as a home,” says Dan Palami. The Global and Azkals boss says a football academy is being considered for Cebu.

And yet for all its good work, the CFA actually has a very limited future. PFF has a mandate to merge neighboring football associations into more central governing bodies. That means the CFA will soon be rechristened the Central Visayas Football Association or CVFA and will also cover the province of Bohol. It’s not clear if Mr. Dakay will continue to head that body.

But nonetheless, the future looks sunny for Cebuano football. They may call Cebu the Queen City, but it certainly doesn’t play second fiddle when it comes to the Beautiful Game.

Special thanks to Mike Limpag, Mars Alison, Jinggoy Roa, Rico Navarro, Stanley Villacin, and Ricky Dakay for their help with this article.

Follow Bob on Twitter @PassionateFanPH.