Philippine women’s national football team head coach Mark Torcaso is confident of his capabilities to lead the Filipinas to continued success following the short turnaround from his appointment to the Asian Games. 
 

Although the Australian mentor is racing against time, he sees the involvement a great opportunity to prove himself after having followed the team for a couple of years prior to his appointment. 

The world No. 44 Filipinas are coming off their brilliant run in the FIFA Women’s World Cup last July, where they claimed the country’s first win, male or female, at the football showpiece.

With Alen Stajcic’s departure from the team after taking the country to a sweet football journey, there’s certainly big shoes to fill in and expectations to meet for Torcaso. 

In his 18-month tenure with the Nationals, the program saw steady rise and success in the world stage which it owed to Stajcic’s mentorship, something that Torcaso has made himself aware of.

“It’s a great opportunity for me to be involved in this and having followed the team, I think I’m well equipped to give them my best and our staff that we’ve put on board to give their best also to make sure these girls can hopefully be successful and continue being successful,” Torcaso said. 

The 42-year-old Perth native confirmed that he’s been tasked to keep the program’s steady rise both in the grassroots and international levels for two years. 

The Philippines is formally making its debut at the Asiad with key players from the World Cup keeping their availability for the call-up. 

While the continental tournament is not part of the FIFA calendar, a list of 22 members has been initially submitted by the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) led by Filipinas captain Hali Long and history makers Sarina Bolden and Olivia McDaniel. 

Torcaso, for his part, landed in the Philippines two weeks ago and immediately got to work with the under 17 and senior players. 

“It’s been amazing. I think the first training session that we had, one with some of the World Cup girls, we had some of the 15, 16 year old girls wanting autographs. It was amazing, I think it was good, it was a great idea to have both groups together,” he said. 

“This was all about just tryna engage with the players obviously for them to understand us as a coaching staff. For them to get to know how we wanna play and what we wanna do and as I’ve said, it is a short turnaround to the Asian Games and we will do our best to make sure that we prepare the side for that tournament and then obviously for the Olympic qualifiers as well in the end of October,” he furthered. 

The Filipinas will likely assemble in China for their second camp as some players are expected to join coming from their respective overseas club commitments.