Philippine women’s football team the new queens of SEAG

CHONBURI — Just before lights out at the Chonburi Daikin Stadium on Wednesday, the powerful bright bulbs shone on the Philippine women’s football team.

The Filipinas, in their latest groundbreaking act, took their coronation as new queens of the Southeast Asian Games (SEAG).

It was a sparkling moment for a country once considered a football minnow, one that used to savor moral victories in scoring a goal in the tournament or, during the worst of times, simply getting the ball into the final third.

After decades of trying and watching Vietnam or Thailand seize the tiara, the Philippines finally sat on the SEAG throne.

“Anytime we can put our country on a pedestal and make it the talking point and make sure people are talking about us and know how strong we are I think that’s the most important,” vanguard Liv McDaniel said after the Filipinas met their date with history by beating five-peat-seeking Vietnam on penalties, 6-5, after a 0-0 draw at the end of extra time.

“I’m so proud of this team, so proud to be a Filipino and playing for our country. People are doubting us, saying we don’t belong here. But we belong in this conversation, we belong at the top and we’re just continuing to prove ourselves again and again and we want to be regulars at the top,” she added.

The road to the summit was a rough one for the Filipinas.

They started on the wrong foot, losing to Myanmar in pool play, 2-3. But they struck back hard, beating the Vietnamese to stay alive, 1-0, then routed Malaysia, 6-0, to secure a seat to the semis. That led them to a duel with the host Thais, where they fought back from 0-1 to take the five-time champs to penalties and eventually won the shootout, 4-2, to reach the finals for the first time ever.

Against Vietnam, the Filipinas leaned on the go-ahead spot kick of sixth taker Jackie Sawicki and the great save of Ms. McDaniel against Tran Thi Thu in the shootout to complete their rise.

“We never wanted to end on a loss, we’re going to win gold or we’re going to win bronze, we gave ourselves no choice so the gold was ours for the taking,” said skipper Hali Long, who played her 101^st match with the team in the clincher.

“We didn’t lose our first game to lose in the end. We dug out of the hole we put ourselves in and we fought and we crawled and we did everything we could in our power to get to the semifinals, to get finals and put it away. As soon as we went to PKs (penalty kicks) I knew it was ours.”

Ms. McDaniel credited the team’s character for this new feat, which followed their celebrated 1-0 victory over host New Zealand in their smashing debut at the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2023 and their milestone triumph at the Asean Championships in 2022 in Manila.

“It was really a hard-fought game (finals). Some of us have played five 90-minute matches plus two extra times and PKs so there were definitely heavy legs. But every single team we played against, they were always on the ground, none of us sat down, none of us were tired, none of us were cramping,” she said.

“We had that mentality to go forward and to keep going. I think what brought us to this gold medal and brought us to the end is that mentality of not stopping and not quitting.” — Olmin Leyba