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Philippine Football Federation set to launch national league


The PFF National League Task Force, with PFF president Mariano Araneta Jr. (seated, middle) and AFC Competitions Director and Deputy General Secretary Windsor John (seated, right), set to establish a national league in the near future. Roehl Niño Bautista, GMA News

Philippine football eyes a boost in reach as the Philippine Football Federation (PFF) launched a task force on Monday to establish a national football league in two to three years.
 
"Ang gusto natin is a nationwide professional league, community-based," PFF president Mariano Araneta Jr. told media, noting that football abroad is played with fans supporting clubs from their respective cities.
 
The PFF initially plans to have ten teams for the national league's inaugural year. 
 
"Maybe four from Luzon, four or three from Visayas, and two from Mindanao will start the kick-off of the national league,” said Mariano. “We're looking at places with existing stadiums but that should be the home stadium of the club.”
 
With travel expenses “becoming cheaper,” the task force believes that a “home-and-away” format for league games is now “economically cheaper.”
 
“Because of the Philippine nautical highway, you can have players from Iloilo taking a car and actually driving all the way to Manila using the Roll-On-Roll-Off in less than 24 hours,” said Dr. Bernardo Villegas, chairman of the PFF National League Task Force. “Now the transport costs are going to be very minimal so that will make it easier for you to have a national league that players can go from one city to another.”
 
“There will be a lot of teams from the UFL like Meralco, Kaya, or other top teams that can really be part of this national league,” said Mariano
 
UFL president Randy Roxas (L) with PFF president Mariano Araneta Jr. Roehl Niño Bautista, GMA News

United Football League president Randy Roxas expressed support for the move, saying that “part of our vision together with the PFF was always to have a national league.”
 
“The UFL is under the NCR FA, therefore it is limited in terms of growth to just NCR related tournaments," said Roxas. "Having said that, in order for us to reach a national scope, we need to be working with the federation under their programs as well.”

“We do have obligations to our sponsors, to our media partners, but there's a certain timeline to that. We're hoping that working together with the federation, [it] takes into consideration those timelines that we have on our end," added the UFL president.
 
Roxas also said that clubs in the UFL today are “basically the best clubs in the country,” with some of them playing in tournaments outside of the country.
 
Recently, Loyola Meralco Sparks and Global FC both participated in the invitational Singapore Cup, with the latter also playing in the AFC President's Cup.
 
“I think it's but natural to take into consideration the resources built already in the league and take that as a platform to grow nationally,” said Roxas.
 
The national league will adopt the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) club licensing regulation used in the AFC Champions' League to determine a club's eligibility for a license and for the tournament. 
 
Some club prerequisites include A licenses for all coaching staff members, an under-14 team, and an A-class stadium, said AFC Competitions Director and Deputy General Secretary Windsor John
 
“'A' stadium meaning you need to have 5000-seats, press tribune, you need to have wifi in the stadium, so there are a lot of requirements for you to qualify,” said John. “The club does not need to own the stadium. [They] just need to have a contract saying that [it has] access to this stadium for league matches.”
 
AFC, together with FIFA, will be extending assistance in establishing systems for a national league to work. It will also provide programs for clubs and its players to comply with the confederations standards which the PFF will apply.
 
“We don't want clubs to be professional and the league not to be professional. You need a professional league to manage professional clubs,” said John. - AMD, GMA News
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