Lessons From Our Filipinas World Cup Experience
/
The Philippine Women’s National Football Team after winning in the quarterfinals against Chinese Taipei in the 2022 AFC Asian cup to qualify for the 2023 World Cup (Photo by Camille Rodriguez/PWNT)
First World Cup ever played by a Philippine team.
First debut team to win a game.
First ever WC goal.
The road to this World Cup started over a decade ago, when daughter of a Filipino immigrant to the US was playing competitive grassroots soccer there. Butchie Impelido began thinking what if young Fil-Am girls (his eldest daughter included) could play for a Philippine national team. Tying up with another Fil-Am, Mark Mangune, who had a data-base of young female Fil-Am soccer players, they began an informal program to recruit these girls to try out for a Philippine women’s team which was eventually picked up by the Philippine Football Federation.
The women's team started slowly but by staying together and competing regionally in Asia, they slowly honed themselves as a program eventually winning regional competitions and qualifying for World Cup 2023.
Sarina Bolden scores the Philippines’ first world cup goal in a victory against 2023 Women’s World Cup co-host New Zealand (Source: AP/John Cowpland)
What we learned
The road to the World Cup, the same as any road to a successful undertaking, is one that requires:
Grit – courage and resolve reflecting strength of character.
Discipline – the practice of training people to abide by a code of behavior to succeed.
Productivity – the ability to produce as planned and in a systematic manner.
Caring for each other – the essence of teamwork.
These are the traits of winning teams and World Cup champions.
This women's team has also had an unusual composition that, in analysis, reflects the reality of who we are as Filipinos.
Who is Filipino? The Filipinas and the large supportive crowds of excited Filipinos in New Zealand showed us here how connected the Filipino diaspora is to the nation. We lament that Filipinos leave the country comparing our poorer conditions to the greener pastures abroad. They may have migrated elsewhere, but family ties are strong, and this not only connects them back to the country through overseas remittances, this WC experience revealed another strong connection, that of human resource.
The Filipinas team are all mixed race save for one. Fil-American, Fil-Norwegian, Fil-Australian. Almost all play professionally in those countries plus Serbia, Brazil, Sweden. The display of love of country was evident in the singing of the national anthem. Team co-captain Hali Long – herself born in the US of a Filipina mother – said in an interview how she would tear up when singing “Lupang Hinirang” on the international stage.
This is the power of the diaspora. And in this global age of interconnectedness, open borders, international commerce, connecting the country to Filipino emigrants engaged in groundbreaking science, technology, innovation, business and entrepreneurship, even government is a resource we should tap and connect with.
Building from this World Cup experience
Can we build something bigger from this experience?
What this Filipinas team showed was a mindset on three levels.
Level One: A winners’ mindset
The country and our people should aspire to be the best at whatever we do. Excellence is something many compromise in what they do (puede na). In a world of global competitiveness, nothing short of excellence should be the aspiration. We should not tolerate mediocrity in anything – service, infrastructure, government.
Level Two: A Mindset for discipline and output
Filipinos like to claim we work hard. But, in today’s world, working smart matters more. There are no shortcuts to success. Producing value-added results in a timely manner is what productivity is all about. And our productivity as a country lags behind other countries.
Level Three: Self-confidence in things Filipino
Filipinos tend to look abroad for models when we can look at ourselves instead. There are many examples of this in plain sight.
The Filipinas growth model
We are not a football nation though there are pockets in the country. The Filipinas model started in the US where young Fil-Am girls playing competitive soccer at the high school level were recruited to try out for a national team.
This allowed the original architects to jumpstart the process. Young girl athletes were then nurtured, trained, and molded into a pool of players. Participation in local tournaments was followed by regional friendlies, competitions at higher and higher levels until this World Cup. You might say this was stress-testing through competition.
The next step now is to develop home-grown talent following this growth model. The Philippine Football Federation should build an ecosystem for this bringing together local clubs, schools, local government, and the private sector.
The Filipinas experience provides a great opportunity to build a sports program for our youth, especially girls. Let’s not waste it.
(Source: Inquirer.net)
Juan Miguel Luz was former Dean and Head of the School of Development Management at the Asian Institute of Management, and former Undersecretary, Department of Education.
More from Juan Miguel Luz
