Kaya holds draft for second Reunion Match

MANILA, Philippines - Kaya FC held a press conference for the second Kaya Reunion Match at Skinny Mike’s Sports Bar at the Bonifacio Global City Wednesday afternoon.

This year’s match that will be held at 6pm Saturday, August 31, at the Emperador Stadium at McKinley Hill, will have a new twist to the lineups.

In the first reunion match, the current Kaya squad went up against its alumni team and the results weren’t pretty as the 2012-13 team romped away to an 8-0 win. Over 50 Kaya alumni showed up for that match.

“To make it more balanced and exciting,” said team manager Justin Tolentino, “We held a draft where the two teams – one coached by (founders) Rudy Del Rosario, Mikee Carrion, and Chris Hagedorn and the other by current coach David Perkovic – will have a mix of players from the new squad, alumni, and the youth teams (U-19). That way, it brings the whole Kaya family together.”

Both teams will be playing three periods of 30 minutes each. The winner of each period will be awarded points that will count towards the total. A trophy will be awarded to the winning team.

Team 1: Rudy Del Rosario/Mikee Carrion/Chris Hagedorn

Anton Del Rosario

Alvin Ocampo

Mark Winhoffer

OJ Porteria

Nico Bolzico

Arama Reagan

Eddie Mallari

Kross Ubiam

Josh Miller

Scott Baginski

Mich Severino

Christian Zubiri

Kenshiro Daniels

Francisco Plaza

Ames Legarda

Saba Garmaroudi

Paolo Misa

Dan O’Reilly

Mati Alvarez

Toto

Antonio Raffles

Toshi Hosoe

Besa

Mikel Maniquis

Carlo Liay

Ramon Bonoan

Team 2: David Perkovic/Justin Tolentino/Raffy Herrera

Chris Greatwich

Marco Casambre

Masa Omura

Paul Tolentino

Iñigo Herrera

Emmanuel Mbata

Evan Santos

Rafael Plaza

Danilo de Jong

Gil Talavera

Johnny McArtor

Fabian Lewis

Kale Alvarez

Enzo Jalandoni

Woody Ugarte

Panky Abijay

Nicolas Cruz

Nick O'Donnell

Mari Javier

Joey Arenas

Janrick Soriano

Joel Dabao

Luis Sumera

Andrew Liauw

Enrique Posas

Kaya also made use of the press con to introduce their new signings for the upcoming season. Making their Kaya debut is the younger brother of Azkals and Global midfielder Jason De Jong, Danilo De Jong who plays attacking midfielder; Fil-Dutch left back Andrew Liauw; Mati Alvarez, a defensive midfielder from Argentina; Australian holding midfielder Scott Baginski; former Stallion forward Jovin Bedic; and former Pasargad forward Emmanuel Mbata.

Perkovic, who came in the first month of the league season, expressed excitement about being a part of this "Reunion Match". "It is nice to see how huge the Kaya family is," he said. "To be able to add to its legacy is a big honor for me."

The Australian coach also added that Kaya isn’t done with the tinkering of its squad but he expressed excitement over the new season.