CEBU CITY, Philippines— The Philippine Football Federation (PFF) has announced the official roster for the Philippines Under-23 team that will be competing in the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) U23 Asian Cup 2022 Qualifiers in Singapore that starts on Monday, October 25, 2021.
Among the 23 players of English football coach Scott Cooper, 12 of them are from the Azkals Development Team that will make up the core of the squad.
They are Christian Rontini, Olivier Bias, Jethro Borlongan, Dennis Chung, Yrick Gallantes, Mandy Lloyd Ignacio, Oskkari Johannes Kekkonen, Sandro Miguel Reyes, Mark Francis Swainston, Marcel Ivan Ouano, Quincy Kamemeraad, and Mark Winhoffer.
The rest of the team is composed of Enrico Mangaoang, Jessie Reil Semblante, Justin Baas, Paolo Nicola Perez, David Kevin Setters, Jacob Francis Maniti, Nathan Rilloraza, Shanden Vergara, Kieran Hayes, Miguel Antonio Mendoza, and Jens Sebastian Rasmussen.
They come from different clubs in the country, Italy, the United States, Denmark, England, and Australia.
Baas, Bias, Winhoffer, and Kammeraad played for the Philippine Azkals or the senior men’s national team in last June’s second round of the preliminary joint qualifiers of the World Cup.
The squad is currently in Doha, Qatar and is wrapping up their training camp that was hosted by the Qatar Football Association.
The team is grouped with South Korea, Singapore, and Timor-Leste under Group H. Their first match will be against South Korea at 5 p.m. on Monday at the Jalan Besar Stadium.
Their second match is on Thursday, Oct. 28 against the host country Singapore, and their last Group match, which will be against Timor-Leste, is on Sunday, Oct. 31.
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