11th Thirsty Football Cup organizers (from left) CFA Vice-president Rico Navarro, Neil Montescalros, Pages Holdings Inc. CEO Bunny Pages and Chad Songalia pose during yesterday’s official launching of the country’s biggest football festival at the Thirsty office in Banilad. The tournament will start this Friday at the Cebu City Sports Center football field.
(CDN PHOTO/LITO TECSON)
The 11th edition of the Thirsty Football Cup will adopt major changes in this year’s competition for the benefit of both the participants and organizers.
Set to unfold this Friday, event organizers headed by Pages Holdings Inc. CEO Bunny Pages, said the tournament will be held only at the Cebu City Sports Center (CCSC) football pitch unlike last year where three venues were used. They also decided to cut the number of participants from last year’s 340 to 249.
CHANGES
“We have to make changes so that we can deliver better results to everyone because this is the biggest football festival in the country and we want to make an impression especially that a foreign team will be competing,” said tournament founder Neil Montesclaros during Tuesday’s official launching at the Thirsty office in Banilad.
Montesclaros was joined by Pages, co-founder Chad Songalia and Cebu Football Association (CFA) Vice President Rico Navarro during the launching.
MASSIVE GROWTH
“The Thirsty Cup was a small company when this event started and it grew to this over the years so we are very thankful to the people behind this event’s success. We promise to continue to pursue our goal of supporting football,” Pages said.
The Korea-based ERCO football club composed of Korean booters will be the lone foreign squad compete in the under-20 and men’s open while the vaunted under-13 United Kingdom-based Global Youth Elite FC composed of Filipino players will also compete.
The Korean football squad will arrive on Thursday.
Around a dozen teams from outside Cebu will see action in the different age categories including Ateneo de Davao, Xavier University of Cagayan de Oro (CdO), Silliman University of Dumaguete, Visayas State University (VSU) of Leyte, football teams from Tubigon, Bohol; San Carlos City, Dipolog City, Negros Oriental and Oroquieta City.
There will be 13 divisions in the competition including the premier men and women’s open; 38-above men’s open, girls under-15, under-18, under 13 and under 20 and the boys under-13, under-15, under-18 and under-20 as well as the mixed under-7, under-9, and under 11 categories.
“We would like to thank CFA for helping us through the years. They make our tournament prestigious and well organized because of their professionalism in the field of football,” Pages said.
The matches will begin at 5:30 p.m. this Friday.