Ceres FC arrives in Maldives

By Jerome Galunan Jr.

The Negros Occidental-based and multi-titled Ceres-La Salle FC has finally arrived in Maldives for their scheduled match tomorrow against the home-team of Maziya Sports and Recreation Club of Maldives for the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Cup play-off at the National Stadium in Malé.
The team left Bacolod early Saturday for Manila, then Singapore to Maldives.
Ceres FC Korean head coach Cha Soungyooung saidthey will do their best to win this game and bring home games in Bacolod. “I believe in our team. I believe in our players. We will do our best to win this game,” he assured.
Club Director Ali Bernard Go also reiterated that the team is in good spirit and has been training hard for this game. “Butdefinitely our tactics against Maziya will also be different from the United Football League,” he added.
Team captain Fil-Spanish JuaniGuirado and co-skipper Michael Casas saidtheir team is ready for the match regardless of the number of home crowd inside the arena. “We are 200% ready for the battle. If we win this game, it will boost our confidence going to the next stage,” they stressed during the press conference held earlier for the members of the media in Bacolod before they left for Manila.
The winner of this faceoff will join Group E alongside India’s Bengaluru, PersipuraJayapura of Indonesia, and Warriors of Singapore.
The AFC Cup is an annual international association football competition between domestic clubs run by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). Qualification to the competition is available to clubs from AFC-affiliated countries that fall into the AFC’s “developing nations” category. Countries which are “emerging” nations are eligible to participate in the AFC Cup qualifying play-off, whereas countries which are “mature” nations are entered into the AFC Champions League./

WDJ