Football stakeholders should get their act together

When Thomas Dooley first took charge of the national team, he had a meeting with the local stakeholders—the UFL and the UFL clubs—to map out his vision for the senior team. During the time of previous coach Michael Weiss, player availability was a highly divisive (and publicized) issue and the new coach wanted none of that.

Now, no longer as publicized as before (because there isn’t as much interest in the national team?), player availability, sadly, is still hounding the team.

It is highly ironic, too, that the Philippine Football League, touted to save the domestic scene and to boost our national team, plays a part in this one. In pre-2010, there was no club vs. country issue. Now that we have a growing club scene it’s a repeating scenario. Ceres, in the past, has always cited the Fifa guidelines on the release of players, while Dooley kept hoping clubs would release their players earlier so they could have more time to train.

Most of our NT team members are in Global Cebu FC and Ceres Negros, the two busiest clubs because of their AFC and PFL campaigns. Can you fault Ceres Negros if it holds on to its players sighting club duties, knowing it still is in the running in the AFC Cup. I guess, this is where the PFL could have stepped in. It is, after all, the brainchild of the PFF and shouldn’t it be a matter of one guy crossing the next hall to the office of the guy running the PFL?

A couple of months back, before the PFL was supposed to start I told a friend that it’s very obvious the league was very unprepared. Already delayed for about a year, why not delay the launch some more to make sure ever kink is ironed out?

“You’re right, but they seemed bent on launching the league,” my friend said but though not in such politically correct terms.

And now Dooley is lamenting that because of the PFL, some of the national team members have four games in two weeks or six in three. “There was no rest....so hard to get a positive result,” Dooley told Bob Guerrero of Rappler.

I’ve always believed that because ours is a growing football scene, the local clubs and the PFF must work together. The local clubs will benefit if the Azkals succeed, the Azkals will benefit if the local clubs succeed.

However, it seems that’s not the scenario, the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing. How did it come to this? The guy in charge of the PFL, Edward Gastanes, is he sec-gen of the PFF.

Surely coordinating is not that difficult? We have enough trouble, as it is, on the availability of Daisuke Sato, Javier Patino and Neil Etheridge , adding domestic issues to that is of no help.

Just imagine what huge boost it would be to the local scene if we make it to the AFC Cup, something we haven’t done. Perhaps, after last night’s Tajikistan game, whatever the result, it’s time to call another meeting of the local clubs, PFL and the PFF?

I’ve always believed that because ours is a growing football scene, the local clubs and the PFF must work together. The local clubs will benefit if the local clubs succeed.