Azkals Live

I confess to be non-sporty thus rendering my ignorance in the world of sports, in simpler words, lampa. Hindi ko alam pa'no ko naitawid 'yung mga PE subjects ko noong araw. Hehe! I'm not good at any ball games but I'm relatively good at CHEERING!! So, when we learned about the 2nd leg of the Thai-Phil game for the semi-finals for AFF Suzuki Cup here in Bangkok, we hurriedly went to buy tickets to cheer for the Philippines. Besides, the husband is a football fan so he really wanted to watch it live. Unfortunately, it was sold out. I wasn't completely disappointed, but I know the husband was. Later on, we learned that Phil. Embassy staff and officials were given complementary tickets for the game! Yay! Buti na lang hindi kami bumili. 

                                             

It was my first time to watch a sport in a huge stadium and was tremendously astonished by the Thai crowd! All of them were in high spirits to cheer for the Thailand Football Team (The War Elephants), everyone was bringing huge Thai flags, they were wearing shirts with Thai symbolism, their faces painted with Thai flags and some even wore bandana around their heads in Thai flag colors (blue, red and white). The way they cheered for their team pushes their players to kick the ball to the goal! I'm not even sure if we, Filipinos, reached 1% in the crowd. We were drowned in the Thai spirit. 

Rajamangala Sports Stadium, Bangkok, Thailand

The Philippine Football Team (Azkals) lost the game with a crashing 3-0 score in favor of The War Elephants. The "boos" from the crowd every time an Azkal player kicks the ball to the goal helped in decreasing the latter's morale. I am not a sports commentator of some sort (lampa nga, 'di ba?) but having a Thai referee who waved numerous penalty flags and one red tag for the Azkals and ignoring foul actions from the The War Elephants, demoralized the Filipinos more. Sa crowd pa lang, dehadong dehado na tayo. We cannot contest though how great football players the Thais are, they are homegrown talents in comparison to our very own Azkals who are 90% imports. Adding to that, football is not rooted in our culture the same way basketball is. A friend told me that when the 1st leg of the game was held in Rizal Memorial Stadium in Manila last week, the Filipino crowd was very few. That alone says so much of our support for the Azkals. :( 

                              

After the game, we met the team at their hotel and it was an awkward salubong. We did not know what to say. The air would be very different if they won the game, but losing with a score of 3-0 is so downgrading. We still congratulated them for giving their best for the country and had quick photo ops. 

The Philippine Football Team (Azkals) with the Phil. Embassy staff, officials and spouses. They cannot even smile for the camera. :( 

Masakit maging talunan. The Azkals did a great job though by putting the Philippines in the map of AFF and their performance increased our rank in FIFA. I really hope that the next time I would be cheering for them, I'd be screaming Pinoy sounding names and not foreign-sounding ones. Mas nakakaproud yun.