Football Going Full Speed

Football shifts to high gear today as the Cebu Football Association (Cebu FA) goes full swing with its line-up of football tournaments with the start of the Aboitiz Cup Men's League. It has been a busy third quarter of the year for football with every weekend of the calendar filled with football games at any of Cebu's football fields: San Roque, USC-TC, CIS and Sacred Heart School-Jesuit.

The football season kicked off in September with the Aboitiz Cup Football Festival for teams for 10 years old and younger. This was followed by the CESAFI tournament and the ongoing Aboitiz Cup for the B12 and B15 age groups. The start of the Men's League thus tops off the staggered launch of football tournaments for all football players from the young ones all the way up to the young "once."

All these are the fruits of the hard work and drive of CebuFA President Jonathan "Maxi" Maximo who has undoubtedly become the spark plug that Cebu football has been looking for to wake things up and bring Cebu back its heydays of the sport. It hasn't been a smooth and easy ride to where it is now, but it has all been worth it. Today, more schools are now into football and teams from other provinces have already joined CebuFA's tournaments.

The "happy" problem that now faces the CebuFA is how to accommodate all these clubs who have now made the football scene so crowded. Crowded? Yes, due to the lack of football fields! I can't quite recall if we ever had such a "nice" problem in the past, but I'm sure it's a problem Maxi wouldn't mind dealing with, rather than not having any football clubs heeding the call to wake up the scene.

With all age groups playing football and more clubs catching the football virus despite the lack of football fields, will Maxi stop now? Not at all. Knowing Maxi, I'm certain that this is only the start of bigger things to come as a lot more can be achieved for Cebu football. In fact, he's most likely already working on a blue print for the future of the CebuFA. Remember that his dream is to get a Cebuano to play in the World Cup

The pursuit to get more schools or clubs to get into football will always be there. While the scene has been dominated by private schools, there are many schools (private or public) that still haven't started their own programs. And there's a niche close to Maxi's heart that hasn't gotten involved yet, the public school sector that has a lot of untapped talent.

Another concern that deserves attention will now be the rationalized formats of games for the various age groups, especially the 10 years old and below kids. The format now being applied nationwide for football competitions is the regular 11-a-side format for the age groups from Under-12 and older.

But for teams in the Under-10 and younger brackets, the football festival type of games seems to be the most appropriate due to their size and physical limitations. As the older boys (12 years old and above) play regular full-length 11-a-side football games, their younger counterparts (10 years and below) play 7-a-side games in smaller fields and for shorter durations. And this is the current set-up for the Aboitiz Cup.

The concern for the younger kids though, is that they'll get to play only once in an official tournament since it's a one-day festival/tournament. As their older football brothers are now busy playing every weekend, the young ones don't have any football action. But this shouldn't be a problem as one can always stage a regular series of football festivals for these age groups. And we can learn from other areas like Manila.

The football festival series is a format being used by the Rizal Football Association (RIFA) with its Red Ribbon RIFA Football Festival. The RIFA's format calls for the teams in the age groups of B98, B96 and B94 (referring to the year they were born) to play in a series of four football festivals spread across from September to October (second grading period of the schools). The fourth festival is the finals round where the top eight teams of each age group square off in a playoff format final round. And while all these are being played, the regular RIFA tournament for the older kids is also being played (from B92 and older).

I'm sure this can also be applied in the local scene where a football festival can be held every month for the B10 and younger age groups. Yes, there may be a problem with the lack of fields, officiating crew and logistics, but this shouldn't be an obstacle to achieving our dreams.

Let's face it. Football is already in high gear and approaching cruise control. Let's not step on the brakes now as we ride on towards our dreams.

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Time-out: Happy birthday to my sister Dra. Naomi Navarro Poca! >>> You can reach me at [email protected].