CVFA Football
CVFA Football. Sports fans, more particularly football enthusiasts, must now get used to hearing this new term. From Cebu Football, it will now be called CVFA Football with the rise of the regional football association under the umbrella of the Philippine Football Federation: the Central Visayas Football Association. The CVFA was set up in the first quarter of the year and is gung ho on giving the region football activities all-year round. The CVFA is led by its president Engr. Rodney Orale, civil engineer and contractor by profession.
Did you say busy? Ever since the new set of officers took over, they’ve been busy preparing the year ahead. A gold medal for Central Visayas in Elementary Football at the Palarong Pambansa greeted / highlighted the summer. Region 7 also won the silver medal in Secondary Football at the Palaro in Davao. Following this feat was the holding of the Allianz National Youth Futsal tournament Cebu leg for the Boys and Girls Under 14 and 16 age groups. The four champion teams qualified for the Visayas Regional Finals in Bacolod, and the Visayas champions travelled to Manila for the national finals. A welcome side activity to this was a futsal workshop with legendary futsal coach Victor Hermans who serves as a consultant to the Allianz Futsal tournament.
One of the biggest and newest developments in Philippine football is the staging of the Philippine Football Federation (PFF) U-15 Boys National Championship. It’s nationwide in scope for all the regional football associations across the country. Each FA will put up an Under 15 team from among its best players in the region and play against each other in a home-and-away format. The Visayas group is composed of Eastern Visayas, Negros Occidental Football Association (NOFA), Negros Oriental Siquijor Regional Football Association (NOSIRFA), Panay/Iloilo and the CVFA. It’s practically a group of death with NOFA and Panay/Iloilo considered as favorites. CVFA kicks off its campaign by hosting NOFA on June 29 here in Cebu. The unique format will have the teams playing each other at home and at the other team’s home pitch. For Cebu, the CVFA is looking at the football pitches of the Cebu City Sports Center, Sacred Heart School-Ateneo de Cebu and Don Bosco Technical College for its home games. The winner of the group moves to the national finals that will be held later in the third quarter of the year. This is really exciting as this brings back memories of the Coke Goal for Goal tournament an Under 16 tournament that was also nationwide in scope.
The rest of the year is going to be one heavy schedule of football festivals and 11-aside tournaments. The 4th SHS-Ateneo de Cebu Championship will be played over two weekends of July, featuring a seven-a-side football festival for the youth age groups July 13-14 and an eleven-a-side tournament for the born 2003 age group July 20-21. Games will be played at the Fr. Julian Hernando SJ Athletic Field in the SHS-Ateneo de Cebu campus in Canduman.
The 21st Aboitiz Football Cup, the CVFA’s biggest tournament, gets going around the end of July and will run until December, with different age group games played at different times to maximize playing time for all. Meanwhile, the CESAFI football tournament will be played between September and October.
Among the football festivals also calendared include the San Roque Festival in August, Engineer’s Cup and the Sun Star Festival in October. The DepEd series of City Olympics or division meets will be held in November. Other football and futsal weekend festivals are also expected to hosted by different clubs and LGUs in a calendar that will be packed every weekend. For “something new” this year, I’d like to see the Bohol tournaments also sanctioned and supervised by the CVFA
Since the bar has been set for CVFA Football, its leaders will have to set its sights on winning the gold medal at the Palarong Pambansa for both elementary and high divisions and girls futsal. We should also target going all the way to the national finals of the inaugural PFF Under 15 national tournament. This is easier said than done though as this will require a united front for the CVFA. While the tournaments will see the traditional powerhouses clash against each other, this will also be a perfect opportunity to make each other more competitive. If all teams can put on this mindset of playing its best to make everyone level up vis-à-vis seeing the opponent as a foe or enemy that one has to “beat,” the CVFA will go a long way. The tougher competition, the better for CVFA Football. And we’ve seen this in display at the recent Palaro where both elementary and high school football teams reached out to bring in players from other teams for reinforcement.
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