ILOILO City -- Iloilo and Manila outclassed separate rivals Wednesday to emerge as the early favorites at the start of the third Adidas Cup Under-19 national football finals at the Central University of the Philippines pitch here.
Marlon Solas completed a hattrick to power the Ilonggo booters past La Salle Iligan, 7-0, in Group B and Winnie Subere likewise was a one-man wrecking crew as the Manila boys, bannered by Mendiola United, swamped Cebu, 7-0, in Group A.
In matches played at the Colegio de San Agustin field, Zamboanga kept pace with Manila in Group A by beating Cagayan de Oro, 2-0, and M'lang National High School of Cotabato subdued Masbate, 3-1, for its first win in Group B.
Dumaguete crushed Davao, 4-1, in the lone Group C match held at the La Paz pitch in this Adidas-sponsored tourney backed y Globe Telecoms.
Gracing Wednesday's opening ceremonies at the CPU field were Philippine Football Federation Rene Abad, Iloilo Football Association Carlos "Titus" Perez Jr. and Adidas trade and promotions assistant Goody Custodio.
Playing in front of their hometown fans, the Iloilo booters found Iligan a tough nut to crack in the early going and only settled down when striker Solas broke away to score the icebreaker from the right flank in the 32nd minute.
The Iligan boys were never the same after that as Iloilo went on a six-goal rampage in the second half, capped by third and last goal of Solas, a Coke Go-for-Goal product, in the 90th from pointblank.
Mendiola United was just as dominant with Subere, recovering from a collision with the Cebu goalie early in the first half, doing most of the damage as he struck for five markers in the highly-physical encounter.
"Subere is a small but skillful and heady player. He's in my list," said national coach Juan Cutillas, who is scouting the tourney for aspirants to the national under-19 squad that will compete in the Asian Youth tournament in June.
Referee Nicolau Jaime slapped a red card each on Mendiola's Roderick Suner and Cebu's Nino Zapanta for nasty fouls so both will have to serve one-game suspensions.
The top placers in the three groups at the end of the elimination round will advance to the semifinals, along with the second-best overall finisher among the groupings completing the cast.
The semis and final matches will be staged in the nearby football-crazy town of Barotac Nuevo.