Pilipinas-RIFA Boys U13, a selection of best players from four member schools of the Rizal Football Association (RIFA), won 3rd place in the U13 Male Cup Competition of the recently concluded Kanga Cup held in Canberra, the capital of Australia, last July 10-15.
The team�s toughest challenge was playing in chilly weather conditions with mean temperatures of 6 degrees C. After suffering a couple of defeats in the first two days, the boys adapted to the winter season and won their last two games in the elimination round over local Australian teams Trinity Grammar and Southwest Queensland to qualify for the semifinals, but lost to eventual champion PoCheolDong PS of Korea, 1-3, in a tightly-contested match.
Kanga Cup is the largest youth football tournament in the southern hemisphere and one of the biggest in the world. This year�s 21st edition of the football festival had 231 team participants with 3,600 players seeing action in over 600 games. Apart from the Philippines, there were three other international teams, Korea, Malaysia and New Zealand. This is the first time that a Philippine team participated in the event.
Headed by Coach Billy Naluz and Team Manager Mallotte Santos, the team is composed of Carl See (team captain), Ryan Delos Reyes and Jared Yu of Xavier School; Jolo Cadiz of Ateneo; Mauro Acot, Paolo Caballero, Sam Lim, Aldrin Malvarosa and Matthew Osit of Colegio San Agustin; and Alec Adeva, Migo Arcega, Mico Protacio, Raja Santos and Anakin Violan of HEdCen.
A grant from the Kanga Cup Organising committee, through Kanga Cup tournament director Mr. Adam Castle, enabled the Pilipinas-RIFA Boys U13 team to fund most of their tournament expenses. Mr. Sorin Clenci of Pinoy Football Aid, some members of the Filipino community in Canberra and a local company, AdStrat, also gave their support to the team.
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