Villaflor: Too much hype can’t kill you

By Noel S. Villaflor

THERE is no such thing as too much hype, unless you believe there’s such a thing as “too much excessive publicity.”


But hype directed toward the Azkals is what bothers a sports official to the point of excess.

Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) president Jose Cojuangco is “worried about high expectations” from the Philippine men’s national team.


“There seems to be too much publicity. But I hope that we win. We’re good. But we have to understand that we’re coming up from the bottom. I hope we don’t expect too much,” Cojuangco was quoted as saying in a report from a national broadsheet.


Now I wonder if Mr. Cojuangco is ill-advised about the matchup between the Philippines this Feb. 9, particularly on who the favorites are.


The POC official hopes “that we win.” Correction, sir, the Azkals are expected to win.


The question really is by what score line? Perhaps 3-0, as team captain Aly Borromeo earlier predicted? Or by 5-0, the same score last year against Macau, which beat Mongolia 2-0?


No one has told Mr. Cojuangco that is necessary to score as many goals as possible on home soil because the Mongolians are a tough nut to crack when playing in the freezing and high-altitude Ulan Bataar, conditions that the Azkals are not accustomed to. And that is what the POC president should be worried about, not the game in Panaad.


Mr. Cojuangco goes on to say that the public shouldn’t “expect too much” from the Azkals because this might put too much pressure on the players.


This statement borders on condescension. And it shows Mr. Cojuangco has no clue of what kind of adversity the Azkals have been through, and by extension, of what stuff these footballers are made of.


A team wilting from the pressure of too much expectation? Perhaps Mr. Cojuangco is talking about a different team from another sport. But definitely, not the Azkals, who have impressed upon us a formidable team with the strongest of backbones.


And the Azkals have done so since 2005, in the same beautiful City of Bacolod, in the same historic stadium of Panaad.


The hype that Mr. Cojuangco speaks of is nothing new, at least to the Bacolodnons.


While the rest of the country, with the exception of a couple of football hotbeds in the Visayas, ignored the team, the people of Bacolod welcomed the Azkals with the warmest adoration, lavished them with cheers, threw whimsical kisses at them wherever they went, win or lose.


And there was no need of hype. The sight of girls going gaga over the Azkals, again, is not a new phenomenon (the only difference now is that footage of such hysteria is shown on national primetime television).


In Bacolod in 2005 during the Southeast Asian Games, I witnessed how more than 10,000 spectators—a conservative estimate—trooped to Panaad to show their support for the team. I could still hear the chorus of screaming fans jumping in celebration every time the Azkals scored.


When the team lost, the fans, particularly the girls waiting near the team bus, would console the dejected players with adulation never seen before in the history of Philippine sports. (Fans don’t scream senseless upon the sight of Manny Pacquiao, although many of them yelp: “Manny, Manny pengeng balato.”)


The same welcome was given when the Azkals returned in 2006 for the AFF Championship Qualifiers, where they advanced to the finals, an achievement regarded as Philippine football’s finest hour at that time.


The Bacolod fans swarmed the Azkals with the same zeal—and such was the frenzy every time a player threw a jersey, still soaked in sweat—at the predominantly female crowd surrounding the Azkals bus.


For all the team’s success, there was no hype. National television was quiet as an empty stadium, and only one national broadsheet carried the story. There was no hype, but the team hadn’t any need of it.


Right now, all the hype surrounding the team is almost surreal. But let it be a gift, nevertheless, one that’s long overdue.


The Azkals deserve all the hype, for what they’ve achieved, for what they’ve been through. Let’s not deprive them of such a pleasurable experience, even if it’s too much for a bureaucrat to take.


(nsvillaflor@gmail.com)


Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on February 05, 2011.