Malditas win, fail to advance

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Malditas picked up their second victory in group play via a 7-0 rout of Palestine, but still fell short of advancing to Round 3 of the AFC Women’s Olympic Football Tournament Qualifiers Tuesday night at Saoud bin Abdulrahaman Stadium in Doha, Qatar (early yesterday Manila time).

Needing a big win to keep their Tokyo 2020 Olympic hopes alive, the Filipinas unleashed a surge of goals against the Palestinians led by brace-scoring Eva Madarang and Sara Castaneda to finish Group C action with six points.

However, it wasn’t enough as Chinese Taipei clinched its third victory at the expense of Iran, 4-1, to tally a group-best nine points and eventually beat the Filipinas in the race for a Round 3 ticket.

“We fell short of our goal but I’m so proud of our performance overall,” said veteran Patrice Impelido. “We’ll come back stronger for sure.”