Azkals call up 27 for Suzuki Cup duty

The Philippine Football Federation has called up 27 players to comprise the preliminary roster for the AFF Suzuki Cup.

Stephan Schroeck of United City leads the squad as captain, with Patrick Reichelt acting as vice-captain. Mike Ott, Martin Steuble, Angel Guirado, and Kenshiro Daniels also got enlisted by head coach Scott Cooper and his staff.

Amani Aguinaldo, Kevin Ingreso, Iain Ramsay, and Daisuke Sato are back after sitting out the dual World Cup and Asian Cup Qualifying this past June, with recent call-ups Jeff Tabinas, Mar Diano, Bernd Schipmann and Kevin Ray Mendoza also returning.

Fresh from their stint in AFC U-23 Qualifying are Oliver Bias, Justin Baas, Dennis Chung, Quincy Kammeraad, Oskari Kekkonen, Sandro Reyes, and Christian Rontini.

After a long naturalization process, Bienve Marañon will finally make his Azkals debut, alongside Matthew Custodio, Harry Foll, Amin Nazari, and Jesper Nyholm.

Notables missing out on the competition are Jarvey Gayoso, Manny Ott, Carlie De Murga, Sebastian Rasmussen, Adrian Ugelvik, and Canada-based brothers Michael and Matthew Baldisimo.

A few more were ruled out due to club commitments. With the competition being held outside of the FIFA international window, clubs are not obliged to release players. This includes the likes of Neil Etheridge, Gerrit Holtmann, Michael Kempter, Raphael Obermair, and Patrick Strauss, as well as the likes of Patrick Deyto, and Josh Grommen.

Meanwhile, both Javier Patino and Michael Falkesgaard have called time on their international careers.

Cooper says about the Suzuki Cup, "This is a very prestigious tournament. We have a history of doing well and going to the semifinals, but we need to do more than that. We have to look at the last Suzuki Cup (in 2018) and that half of that schedule, was in the FIFA calendar. For this tournament, we have so many players unavailable and most of them were unable to be released by their clubs. We don’t have that luxury as other countries so we’re hoping that organizers look at the calendar in the future."

Team manager Dan Palami acknowledges that preparations for the tournament have been far from ideal, especially with players still in club competition with less than a couple of weeks from the start. He adds, "We have to deal with the situation. I think now more than ever, the team will have to summon the never-say-die spirit that Filipinos are known for."

Cooper also shares, "It’s extremely difficult hence we have to temper our expectations. We have a nice squad and we have a new addition in Jesper Nyholm, whose season is finally finished, so we can bring him in and there’s couple of new faces coming in."

Nonetheless, he says the Azkals still need to be ambitious and “represent ourselves well.”

"We have a good squad, we must be positive and go on and show what we can do."

Slotted in Group A, the Philippines will kick off their campaign against hosts Singapore on December 8, followed by matches against Timor Leste on the 11th and Thailand on the 14th, all at the Singapore National Stadium. They will finish off against Myanmar at Bishan Stadium on December 18.

Twenty seven players make up the Azkals lineup for the AFF Suzuki Cup 2020 set in Singapore beginning December 5.