Philippine football body taps UK coach as technical director

MANILA, Philippines — UK-born football coach Stewart Hall will be taking on a new role in Philippine football after being appointed technical director.

Formally welcomed by the Philippine Football Federation in a press conference on Friday, Hall will oversee the development of football in the country across the men's, women's and youth teams.

Hall is a veteran in international football, as both manager and technical director of different clubs in four different continents.

According to PFF President Mariano "Nonong" Araneta, having a man of Hall's caliber on board to uplift Philippine football is a great development.

"It's really fitting that we at PFF would get a man like him to implement a roadmap for football development in our country," Araneta said.

Hall's task will not be limited to just developing the pools of players across the national teams, but also upping the game for coaching in the country.

"He is very much qualified, very much competent... In tandem with our coaching education department, we dream of later on having a pro-level membership in [the] AFC coaching education convention," said PFF secretary general Atty. Ed Gastanes.

"Coach Stewart is in a proper position to help us achieve that," he added.

Currently, the PFF only has license to offer courses to give coaches the AFC B, and A diplomas.

The NSA hopes to be able to give out the highest of those diplomas — a pro diploma — to improve the quality of local coaches in the country.

'The game model'

Tasked to up the ante of football in a country where the sport is still in its developing stages, Hall plans to use a prominent philosophy moving forward: the game model.

The game model is defined as an approach where a coach works backwards from the game of football itself when planning and forming tactics in a program's future.

"You've got that pulling everything together [across the teams and PFF] as one of the big challenges. Now the way that that's done in the best football nations in the world is through a game model," Hall said.

"A philosophy and a game model laid down about how we want our teams to look, how we want them to behave, how we want them to play, [and] how we want the coaches to develop that. [It] pulls everything together," he added.

According to Hall, the game model philosophy will be able to unite all aspects of Philippine football and thus create a better environment for everyone.

"That game model and that philosophy is gonna pull together the men, the women, the PFF, the 7,100 islands, the players who are playing in America, the players who are playing in Europe. That game model is the vehicle that pulls it all together. That's what we've been working really hard at behind the scenes," he said.

The PFF is currently swamped with a number of events coming this year like the 31st Southeast Asian Games.

Also on the calendar are the AFC Asian Cup qualifiers for the men's side and the AFF Women's Championship.