Friday, May 25, 2012

Dary makes his point

Some of the Cambodian U-14 squad, who are likely smaller in stature than their upcoming opponents
The Cambodia U-14 national team leave these shores for the AFC Festival of Football in Malaysia this weekend, full of youthful hope and optimism. And why not, they are the best of their age-group in the country and have worked hard to put into practice the style of quick, passing football that head coach Bouy Dary wants to see his youngsters play. One point that Dary makes forcibly is on age-cheating. This is where players are given fictitious birthdates/passports that allow them to appear in age-group competitions when their real birthdates would make them ineligible, as they are too old. This has been a blight on youth football for many years in Asia and Africa and FIFA have made great strides over the last few years to cut it out. "I disagree strongly with this practice and will make sure it will not be allowed to happen whilst I'm responsible for this team. I'm sure our boys will be physically smaller, but for me, we must take the correct age for the boys, see how they perform against other countries and then we can see how much we need to develop them, in order to be competitive. I feel very strongly about this." He's also keen to keep his squad together after this festival and will talk to the federation about getting them together, perhaps once or twice a month. There is little doubt that this U-14 squad will be the best prepared and the most closely-knit of any Cambodian team of its age, especially with 17 of the 22-strong squad coming from the Phnom Penh Crown Academy team, which Dary mentors as the Crown head coach. The Malaysia festival will be the fifth and final AFC Festival of Football this season after four regional festivals that have already taken place in Qatar, Pakistan, China and Nepal. There are twelve nations joining the South East Asia regional series in Kinabalu, Malaysia with Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Australia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Timor Leste and Vietnam joining the hosts and Cambodia.
The Nepal U-14s who led their festival and look considerably bigger and stronger than their Cambodian counterparts

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't think Nepalese players are under 14s.

Andy Brouwer said...

Well they certainly feed them well if they are. The moustaches and beards are a bit of a giveaway! I'm sure their documentation is in order but MRI scans might reveal some interesting information. Such scans are usually introduced at U-16 level for AFC competitions.

ImKhmer said...

Nepal men are just about the same size as our Cambodian men but how come their boys are a lot bigger than ours? Maybe their boys grow up faster than our boys at young age but they stop growing earlier than our boys? lol