Conference call

PPCFC president Rithy Samnang addresses the assembled press corps

It's been a week since Phnom Penh Crown held their press conference to announce the installation of Sam Schweingruber as their new head coach. The Swiss national has been in Taiwan for a few days with one of his girls from the SALT Academy programme that he's been in charge of for the past six years, attending a conference on promoting the rights of young girls in Asia. At the end of this month he'll be heading to the prestigious Peace & Sport Awards 2012 in Sochi in Russia, where SALT are shortlisted for the NGO of the Year. In the meantime, starting tomorrow, Crown will hold three days of open trials for potential new recruits, where Sam and his coaching team will be running the rule over a group of hopefuls with dreams of joining the Crown squad for the coming season. You may recall that nine players were selected from similar open trials last season and most of them went onto play at some point in the Metfone C-League season. 855 Media Group, owners of the 855 Sport & Lifestyle Magazine, were at last week's press conference with their camera in hand, as these photos show.

The top table with coach (Sam Schweingruber), president (Rithy Samnang) and press officer (Andy Brouwer)

Head coach Sam Schweingruber listens to the question

The new PPCFC coach answers in fluent Khmer

PPCFC's press officer (right) asks for more questions

The coach waiting to offer up his view of the future at PPCFC

Rithy Samnang responds to a question with the press officer nearby

The new head coach with his staff. LtoR: Bouy Dary, Sam Schweingruber, Prak Vanny, Kao Kiry

Chewing the fat

Chewing the football fat with Rick (in blue) in the hotel lobby

A photo from our visit to Singapore surfaced on the blog of Rick Olivares, a PR and media guy who was the press officer of the Philippines outfit taking part in the competition, Loyola Meralco Sparks. They were staying in the same hotel as Crown. Rick has his own blog, Bleachersbrew, on football in the Philippines, which is rising fast and furious, so worth checking it out, here. Loyola beat Geylang 2-1 to advance into the Q-F's of the Singapore Cup.

Before the game

Having a chat with Tampines coach Steven Tan before the game. Pic Andrew Him.

Andrew Him, a photographer in Singapore, snapped a couple more pictures of me before the match began on Wednesday night. He also took some great action shots of the game, which he's posted onto his Facebook page. He felt the floodlights weren't strong enough for good photography, but then he's never been to a game at the Olympic Stadium under lights. Then he would have something to be annoyed about. I hear the AFC tested the Olympic lights for their lux value recently and found them hopelessly understrength for international matches. No surprise there.

Reviewing the opposition team line-up with Crown coach David Booth. Pic. Andrew Him.

Back of my head

Updating Facebook at last night's Singapore Cup game. Pic Andrew Him

This guerrilla photo was taken behind my back, quite literally. Andrew Him is a photographer from Singapore who popped up to the press-box at the Clementi Stadium last night and sent me this reminder that I spent most of the match updating the Phnom Penh Crown Facebook page or jumping up and down and shouting whenever we scored - not a great idea as I was sat next to the match commissioner though I gave him a copy of the Crown Yearbook to keep him happy. Thanks for the picture Andrew. For the first time in my life I look almost studious.
I had a brief chat with former Crown head coach Bojan Hodak yesterday as his new team, Kelantan from Malaysia are in the Malaysian FA Cup Final this weekend. The people of the province of Kelantan are mad about their football and in two days of going on sale, 30,000 tickets had been snapped up for the final. They are expecting a 90,000 crowd at the national stadium in Kuala Lumpur with Kelantan providing the majority. In fact the provincial authorities have declared Sunday, the cup final day, as a national holiday.

Darith's view

Crown head coach David Booth in a lighthearted moment at today's event

Photographer Huy Darith joined the Phnom Penh Crown pre-season press conference this morning and captured these moments in time.

The MC looking forward to the new season

"Does it really take that long to translate a sentence?"

David Booth and Rithy Samnang enjoying themselves

Khim Borey speaks while Kouch Sokumpheak looks on

A view of the top table at today's press conference