The Philippine women’s national football team will be facing an uphill climb towards defending their title in the ASEAN Football Championship.
The Philippine women’s national football team will be defending their ASEAN crown after three years, as they head to Vietnam on Sunday for the MSIG Serenity Cup. They will be featuring a youthful team mixed with a handful of veterans and key holdovers from the 2022 titlists.
With the tournament not being part of the FIFA window, most key players for the Filipinas who are currently signed with overseas clubs were unavailable — such as Sara Eggesvik, Meryll Serrano, Angie Beard, and Jaclyn Sawicki, to name a few.
Instead, Filipinas skipper Hali Long will banner a grand total of six holdovers from the squad that won the AFF Women’s Championship in Rizal Memorial Stadium three years ago. Joining her are goalkeepers Olivia McDaniel and Inna Palacios, along with Malea Cesar, Kaya Hawkinson, and Quinley Quezada.
Olivia’s sister Chandler, who is part of this year’s roster, was injured at the time the Filipinas won the crown.
Joining the holdovers are familiar faces in recent camps and competitions such as Rhea Chan, Janae Defazio, Charisa Lemoran, Isabella Passion, Isabella Alamo, and Dionesa Tolentin.
Also in the fold are Nina Meollo, Alessandrea Carpio, Adelaide Wyrzynski, Nina Mathelus, Jaycee Defazio, Aliana Weibel, Aaliyah Schinaman, Tea Pidding, Lyka Cuenco, and Azumi Oka.
For Filipinas head coach Mark Torcaso, the current lineup poses a unique challenge and opportunity for the team to shoot for their title defense but also working on the bigger picture as they prepare for the 2026 AFC Women’s Asian Cup in Australia.
“We’ve got a long players here, we’ve got some new players that haven’t been in camp before and you know, this not being a FIFA window, it’s a good chance for us to test them and see where they’re at,” Torcaso told media at the sidelines of the Filipinas’ sendoff at Studio 300 in Makati on Saturday.
“Obviously, we’re gonna go there with an intention to win because we’re gonna defend the title. But we also have to consider that there’s a lot of young players in here and we want to give them the opportunity to play senior international football and see if they’re ready for Asia Cup because that’s obviously what we wanna aim for and what we wanna go to: another World Cup," he added.
Torcaso recently went to Australia for the draw where the Filipinas ended up in a difficult group, matched up with hosts Australia in their opening game before facing South Korea and Iran in Group A.
Before anything else though, the Filipinas will be tasked to get things going in Vietnam when they face the Matildas U-23 squad in the Serenity Cup.
They open the hostilities against Timor-Leste on August 7 before playing Australia on August 10.
Long-time rivals Myanmar will be the antagonist for the Filipinas’ final game of the group stage on August 13.
The Filipinas must finish in the Top 2 of their group to advance to the knockout stage.
In the 2022 edition, the Filipinas unseated then-defending champions Vietnam in the semis with a 4-0 drubbing before dominating Thailand in a 3-nil victory in the final to hand the Philippines its first ever championship in international football at any level.