Japan barely beats Azkals, 2-1, in thrilling Asia 7s league final

SHAH ALAM, Malaysia — Azkals co-skipper Misagh Bahadoran strongly believes there’s a bright future for the Philippines in seven-a-side football.

“It shows that at this game, the Philippines is not so far behind,” said Mr. Bahadoran, speaking after the team’s runner-up finish in the Asia 7s Championship here.

The Azkals battled powerhouse Japan tooth and nail and came a goal away from dethroning the champs. It took a sneaky strike from Miran Abe in the comeback period to lift the Japanese past the pesky Azkals in the thrilling finale, 2-1.

“Japan is more established in 7s, they have their own 7s leagues and they brought their best players here. But after the game (finals), they said ‘we’re really surprised how you guys played and hope we play again in the next, finals’,” the Fil-Iranian veteran said.

Mr. Bahadoran and fellow vets Stephan Schrock, Mark Hartmann and Daisuke Sato beefed up the new iteration of the Azkals as they venture into the past-paced game of 7s, which is played on a smaller pitch and composed of two 20-minute halves plus a comeback period that allows the chasing team to try to steal it in extra time.

“Filipinos are good but don’t fully know how to play 7s yet. If the Philippines gets more practice and creates a 7s league, I promise you definitely we’ll be champions within one to two years in Southeast Asia and we can even go to 7s World Cup, there’s a big chance,” said Mr. Bahadoran.

The fighting finish against the favored Japanese should boost the Filipinos’ stock moving forward.

“For me, we had a good result for a first tournament. Now we have to work hard,” said coach Hamed Hajimahdi, the Iranian 7s expert tapped by chief backer Dan Palami for the Azkals’ new venture.

“There’s a lot of small things we have to fix. We also have to find many talents because we didn’t have time for (that) this tournament. There’s a lot of talents, even if they’re not playing pro. Even from the streets like Tondo, we can find talents and we can have another strong team for the next tournament.” — Olmin Leyba