Saturday, May 19, 2012

Academy jet-setters

The PPCFC Academy celebrate 3rd place in the 2011 Singapore Sixes competition
Many of the youngsters in the Phnom Penh Crown Academy squad will be jet-setting around Asia this month and next. On Sunday next week they head for Kinabalu in Malaysia to take part in the AFC Festival of Football as part of the Cambodian U-14s national football squad. The final make-up of the 22-strong squad will be announced tomorrow. They will be rubbing shoulders with eleven other Southeast Asia nations at the festival, designed to promote everything that is good about the game at a young age. They will return home on 4 June. Following on from their Malaysian adventures, half of the Academy group will then be heading to Singapore for the weekend of 30 June-1 July to once again take part in the prestigious Soccer Sixes 2012 tournament, hosted by Singapore Cricket Club. With ex-Arsenal star Ray Parlour as the guest of honour, the PPCFC Academy will join seven other U-14 teams in the Charity Tournament, a competition which they took part in last year, and finished a very creditable third against charitable institutions from Thailand, Indonesia, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Singapore. The Soccer Sixes is now becoming a major event in the Asian football calendar and PPCFC are very pleased to be invited back again, after the youngsters impressed everyone with their footballing talent last time around. The Tournament website had this to say about the Academy boys: 'Phnom Penh Crown Academy finished third overall with a technical display of football that is well beyond their years and became the talking point throughout the weekend with the fans.' Whenever and wherever the youngsters have represented Cambodia and the Academy, they have been a real credit to themselves and their coaches and I have no doubt this will continue. 
Pov Ponvuthy celebrates in style after another PPCFC victory in the 2011 Sixes tournament

2 comments:

ImKhmer said...

For the boys that are going to Malaysia, how many of them are actually 14 years of age?

Andy Brouwer said...

Of the final 22 squad chosen for Malaysia, I can only speak for the PPCFC Academy players.
The following players have already had their 14th birthday: Pov Ponvuthy, Long Phearath, Orn Chanpolin and Ouk Sovann.
The rest of the players are either 13 years old or five players are still 12 years old (such as Sath Rozak, Kim Chhaya, Men Piphop, Suon Noeut and Seut Baraing).
Andy