MANILA – New Philippine Azkals head coach Thomas Dooley has revealed the four factors that he will consider when it comes to choosing the players for the national football team.
Dooley was formally introduced as the head coach of the Azkals last Friday and his first challenge with the squad is to prepare the team for the AFC Challenge Cup in Maldives this May.
When asked what he kind of attitude he would require from his players, Dooley said there were “four things that I have to consider and evaluate.”
“No. 1 is, technically, you have to be good with the ball,” said the coach. “If you cannot handle the ball, then it’s difficult.”
“The second thing is, you have to understand what your role is in the game. For example, if I have a center-back who is always going up front and leaves the back, then I have to talk to him. ‘This is your position, and you have to play that role.’”
“He has to understand the tactical part.”
Dooley said a player’s attitude is also important.
“Everybody should come in and know that it’s a team,” he said, adding that he is looking for players who are willing to work hard for the team’s success.
“The last thing is, you have to be fit,” he said. “If you are not fit, you can’t play. It is impossible to play a professional game or in the national team if you are not fit.”
Dooley has only watched two Azkals games, but is planning to watch UFL games so can observe some of the national team players in action. He is also planning to contact some of the Azkals players who are based in Europe.
“I want to get in touch with them right now. I don’t want to waste any time,” said Dooley. “(They have to) understand how I want to play, and then they can think about already what kind of system we play, what the starting position is when we have the ball, or the starting position when we don’t have the ball.”
Dooley also stressed that it is important for the national team players to understand that they are representing the Philippines every time they step onto the pitch.
“They are representing the whole country,” he said. “And the fans in the Philippines are proud, and we can do a great job to make them happy. That’s what everybody has to understand, but that’s a lot of work.”
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1 day ago
This is all nice, but it will not benefit from the talents playing in Europa.. Unless the PFF starts to acknowledge that they need to implement the Azkals EU into their association and make play off tournaments inside EU, to make the national teams as strong as possible!
ReplyDeleteThe only progress I see with the PFF right now is with their Senior team other than that is just a mere show. I would cite an example about the U16 boys National team where the PFF appointed Anto Gonzales as the new head coach last year but the team failed to impress nation as it was 2nd to the bottom of the standing in the FAM Frenz U16 tournament home and away in south east asia. Among the reasons the team failed big time are due to numerous reasons:
ReplyDelete1. The core of the U14 Little azkals (who participated in Italy and Japan last 2012) was disbanded and new faces where injected mostly coming from NCR.
2. The coaching staff for 2 years was replaced by Anto "the nutritionist" Gonzales and company
3. Since Anto Gonzales is still playing in the UFL under Pachanga Dilliman FC hes' sometimes unavailable for monthly training and couldn't focus on his coaching duties and so is he's Goal Keeping coach Ref Cuaresma (a mainstay at Loyola Meralco last year)
4. Anto Gonzales believes that big and tall players are his favored ones undermining his mirrored players with skills just like him.
5. They will only train one or two weeks prior to a tournament under AFC and AFF because the players come from different parts of the country and he has a UFL games to finish.
6. PFF taps Global FC to absorb most of the national youth players to their UFL categories (and so are the budget because PFF has none in their pockets) but they decide their own head coach when their is an international tournament to participate , cutting the Global coaching staff out in the picture.
7. The PFF has a habit of putting their 'favorite coaches" in the head coaching job even if they are in their 20's and early 30's with under contracts from different UFL clubs.
8. Born 2002 are going again for UK training this August with no definite manager and coaching staff in charge . Training camps are again handled by Global FC which put them in the Total Football and Chelsea camp for 3-4 days only last January 29- feb 2, 2014. In other words, the team had no diffinite training camp on their own- nakikisali lng sila form different clubs just to continue their quest in qualifying for the 2019 U17 World Cup.
If PFF are serious enough , they should put coaches who are focused in coaching alone rather than playing in the professional clubs in UFL. How can we grow if we keep on doing this ?