IN another boost to its grassroots development program, the Philippine Football Federation has been awarded a grant by the International Football Federation to set up a cluster of PFF Centers of Excellence for promising young players across the country starting in January 2023.
“This is another legacy project of our PFF president, Mariano Araneta Jr., who is keen on having a solid and strong grassroots football development program, and we thank FIFA for approving the grant for this project,” said PFF general secretary Atty. Ed Gastanes.
Gastanes added that he has tasked PFF technical director Stewart Hall to oversee the four-year program that will complement the formation of national age group squads for international competitions.
“We presented the program for the Football Centers of Excellence during a recent meeting of the PFF Board of Governors and they passed it, citing the fact that it was very much needed,” Hall said. “It has the backing of everybody.”
Hall said the plans is to have six football centers all over the country, beginning with one in Metro Manila and another one outside of the metropolis sometime in December in neighboring provinces such as Cavite or Laguna.
“What we want to do is to run one or two centers before Christmas and use them as models where we try to iron out the bumps for our succeeding ones,” said Hall, who has identified the facilities and the partners for the program.
“We will work with and try to get the best coaches involved and the certification level that we want,” said the English mentor, who revealed the coaches would need a FIFA A license to handle the program.
He added that having a grass field is a major requirement to the center “because all of the tournaments abroad are played on grass,” adding that they will be working with existing football academies with existing facilities to be partners in the program.
“There are some very good academies that are already running that are approved by the PFL (Philippines Football League) and PFF. Why start something from scratch when there are already decent models there,” he said.
Hall said they intend to target promising booters aged 12 to 16 years and bring them to the center “where they will have good coaches and a suitable environment to develop and learn to play the game properly on a regular basis. This is where we are going”
Once the PFF Centers of Excellence are up and running, he said this will virtually eliminate the guesswork in forming national age group teams for international competition, while sowing the seeds for those who will grow up to become able and competent players for national senior teams.
“The centers will help us develop (national) players for the future. You don’t have to go to 33 Regional Football Associations to get to them. You are a country of 7,100 islands and it is too much ground to cover. You never know if you have the best talent. We try to get the guesswork out of the recruitment,” Hall pointed out.
“The Center of Excellence project will identify the best talent and get them so we take all the guesswork out of the recruitment and that those at the centers can play each other in school holidays and festivals,” he said.
