More Fil-foreigners want to join Azkals

by Peter Atencio

PHILIPPINE football team manager Dan Palami said yesterday that a Filipino-Danish soccer player, who plays for Denmark’s national team and another Fil-Danish, who is with a professional club team, have both signified interest in playing for the Azkals.

Palami said Dennis Cagara, who saw action for Denmark’s national football squad, and Jerry Lucena, a midfielder for the Danish First Division AGF Aarhus, expressed interest in joining the nationals.

Cagara and Lucena’s fathers are Filipino and their mothers Danish.

The 25-year-old Cagara played as a left back for AGF Aarhus in the Danish First Division and has played a total of 43 games, scoring five goals for various national youth teams. He played six games for the Denmark national under-21 football team

The 30-year-old Lucena, meanwhile, played as a midfielder for the same team.

Palami, who has just arrived from Frankfurt after meeting with officials of the Deutscher Futball-Bund, the national sports association for football in Germany, said that Cagara, Lucena and another prospect in Fil-German Stephan Markus Schrock, could immediately join the team as soon as they obtain a Philippine passport.

The 24-year-old Schröck played as a right back for the second division Bundesliga club SpVgg Greuther Fürth. His father is German, while his mother is a Filipina.

The Azkals will also have a new coach in Hans Michael Weiss of Germany, who will start calling the shots for the tryouts and the two-game home-and-away qualifying series against Mongolia for the Asian Football Confederation Challenge Cup.

Palami said the credentials and experience of Cagara, Shrock and Lucena qualify them to be directly accepted by the Philippine Football Federation and play for the Azkals.

“Our policy for (directly) accepting players (into the Azkals) is that they must have played in top division tournaments. The others will have to undergo tryouts,” said Palami.

The three are expected to join the team when the Azkals play Mongolia in the first leg of their home-and-way match in the AFC Challenge Cup on Feb. 9 in Bacolod City.

Five other Fil-European players, including one from Scotland, are also coming to Manila to try out for the Azkals under coach Weiss.

Weiss, who used to coach the national under-17 squad of Rwanda and also held the job as Football Association before accepting PFF’s offer, is expected to arrive in Manila in time for the open tryouts, which will be held on Jan. 17 to 19.

He is the second German to coach in the Philippines since Bernard Zgoll way back in the 1986.

He replaced British coach Simon McMenemy, who does not have an AFC A license, which he needs to be able to coach in the Challenge Cup.

Palami said tryouts will be open for both local and Fil-foreign players alike.

So far, Fil-German Manny Ott and Chris Greatwich will not be able to join team for the AFC Challenge Cup for varying reasons. Ott has been recalled by his mother club, Ingolstadt FC in Germany, and will focus on his studies for the meantime, while Greatwich has recently relocated to New York.

The Younghusbands, Phil and James, remain in the team, along with goalkeeper Neil Etheridge, who is flying back after spending the holidays in England.

Manila Standard