Marooned, But Still Fighting:
The UP Women's Football Team
BY KARMELA LEA GONZALES AND KEITH JASPER MAGCALING
In the history of the University Athletics Association of the Philippines (UAAP), the University of the Philippines Women’s Football Team (UP WFT) is far from the most decorated. Initially established in 1984, the team has gone from cellar dweller to champion in the span of over three decades.
Chasing the dream has taken its toll on the ladies, but in spite of the athletes’ struggles and differences, they were grounded by sisterhood, built around a common dream of bringing honor to the university.
The DIliman-based squad has had its fair share of ups and downs: consistently in the bottom two from 2010 to 2013, a breakthrough came in Season 76 when they shot from the bottom of the table to 2nd place. The team played bridesmaid to Far Eastern University for two years before capping off their Season 78 campaign in 2016 with their first UAAP championship title.
To say the road has been challenging for the UP WFT is an understatement, but their biggest challenge presents itself much closer to home.
False Hopes and The UP-Azkals Football Field
On 8 May 2015, the UP System announced a new partnershipwith the Futbol Pilipinas Azkals Foundation, Inc. (FPAFI) for the renovation of the UP Track Oval — the 2.9-hectare field behind the UP Bahay ng Alumni that plays host to five of the university’s varsity teams.
Set to be completed in December that year, the field would be renamed the UP-Azkals Football Field and serve as the home ground of the men’s and women’s football teams. Later, it would become part of a training facility called the UP Diliman Sports Complex Zone.
“Which athlete would not be inspired to train harder if given new equipment or training grounds?” then-President Alfredo E. Pascual during the announcement. He hoped the rise of the UP Diliman Sports Complex Zone would motivate student-athletes, and contribute to the university’s sporting excellence and student development.
After years of getting by on rundown facilities and limited equipment, the Diliman community was delighted with the news.
“All of us were pretty excited about having a new updated field since the old one was pretty beat up,” Lady Maroon Booter Marie Navea-Huff said. Supporters were equally excited at the prospect of their beloved teams finally getting better facilities to up their game.
It seemed things were finally looking up for the Iskolar-Atleta, but it didn’t take long until they took a turn for the worst.
Despite being announced in May, construction on the field only started towards the end of 2015, and progressed at a very slow rate. In an interview, the university’s Vice President Elvira Zamora cited heavy rains as the cause of delay, compromising field preparations.
Five months after the targeted date of completion and a year after the announcement, Azkals team manager Dan Palami confirmed FPAFI had pulled out of the agreement and no longer had any connections with the renovation project.
Marooned, But Still Fighting
The news came as a surprise to the community, moreso the athletes and teams who were displaced: Marie said they weren’t made aware of the project’s cancellation beforehand.
“The team found out about the project being cancelled by just simply seeing that there has been no new updates for a long time,” she said.
And it’s not just the athletes who are kept in the dark: Sports, Fitness, and Health Committee Head Leandro Anton “LA” Castro said he also has limited information on the field’s development because he was never fully briefed about the situation.
“The admin has never been transparent about this,” LA said. “Some say [the renovation project] got stalled because funding was stopped. Some say that the admin and the alumni did not reach an agreement with regards to the naming of the field.”
“When I met with the Varsity Office Director at the start of my term, he also gave cloudy information,” he added. “I can’t remember clearly, but he said he didn’t know much and it was better to ask the other administrators.”
Aside from published press releases and a handful of articles, the details surrounding the original field renovation plan are very much kept secret to the general public. Dan Palami and FPAFI have never spoken out about the project, and the involved members of the UP Administration also remain tight-lipped.
Efforts have been made to contact the College of Human Kinetics administration and Dean Ronaldo Dizer for a statement, but our requests have gone unanswered as of publishing time.
During the scheduled renovation, the teams that called the Track Oval their home ground — men’s and women’s football, baseball, softball, and track and field — struggled to find facilities for regular training for their UAAP Season 78 campaigns.
“By the time it finally started, it was explained to our Coaches and they told us that we would have to rent elsewhere until the field would be done in four or five months,” Marie’s younger sister and fellow Booter Kali said.
“We were training in the Sunken Garden and in the Gym, even though loads of us were getting injured. We eventually (after about a week or so) ended up renting elsewhere, [and] we just kind of sucked it up.”
With the Track Oval abandoned and unplayable due to unfinished soil compaction, the teams were left facing another year without training facilities.
“We have to sacrifice more time with regards to travel to turf fields that are located in [the] Taguig area,” she said.“We currently train in BGC Turf as much as possible, with a day of weights training and possible time in Marikina, FEU Fern, and Emperador Field.
The UP Track Oval was left unplayable after FPAFI pulled out from the renovation agreement. (Photo courtesy of Kali Navea-Huff)
This requires us to arrange transportation with either the school or, most of the time, carpool, Uber, and Grab.”
The Report on Varsity Consultations also said the team was left without storage facilities, forcing members to commute while carrying all their equipment around.
Members of the WFT are also assigned to the fifth floor of the Acacia dorm, which requires them to carry bags of heavy equipment up numerous flights of stairs. This gets especially difficult for Booters who are injured.
The displaced varsity teams were forced to use nearly 90% of their budgets on renting other training facilities, in addition to the athletes shouldering much of their personal costs — a struggle that heavily affected everyone on the team.
“I know everyone has felt the stress,” Kali said. “It’s hard on everyone.”
Still, Kali and the other veterans on the team make it a point to look out for their juniors.
“Generally, we try to keep it within the seniors to handle everything. It’s been hard especially on us but we don’t want our freshmen or sophomores to have to deal with it until they have to,” she said.
“We just hope that by the time they take over, they won’t have to deal with this.”
In addition to the toll the displacement has taken on the team’s financial capacities, it also put the athletes at greater risk: changing environments and frequent long trips have undeniably cost more than just money.
“Changing up the surface constantly gives our bodies a difficult time adjusting on how to play,” Marie said. “Different type of surfaces and long travel time has made a lot of us injured.”
Kali herself suffered an injury in Season 78, and complications have led to an ACL tear which makes her unable to play at least for this season. The injuries have also required the Navea-Huffs to spend large amounts of money on surgery and rehabilitation.
Kali Navea-Huff (far left) supports the UP WFT from the sidelines after suffering an ACL injury. Her sister Marie (far right) continues to play for the team in the hopes of pulling a back-to-back title. (Photo courtesy of Skip Tan)
However, injury won’t stop Kali from attending games and cheering for her teammates, or from working hard to recover and play. She’s also taken the opportunity to speak out on issues surrounding athlete welfare, as a way to watch out for her fellow student-athletes.
“What’s most distressing is that I’m not the only person this has happened to,” she said.
Silver Linings
It’s been a difficult journey, but Kali, Marie, and the UP WFT was able to reap the rewards of their hard work in their UAAP campaign last year.
The Lady Booters won their first UAAP title, defeating De La Salle University (DLSU) 2–1. Their championship was made all the more special by achieving a much-coveted double: both the men’s and women’s football varsities were crowned champions of Season 78. The teams call the twin achievements a tribute to Rogie Maglinas, a member of the men’s football team who passed away due to cancer earlier that year.
Both UP WFT and MFT pay tribute to their fallen teammate Rogie Maglinas. UP WFT wears kits with “For Rogie” written on the collar while MFT brings Maglinas’ jersey with them after winning the title at the UniGames 2015. (Photos courtesy of Skip Tan and the UP Men’s Football Team)
“We are more of a community than ever before, especially since Rogie brought us together,” Lady Maroon Booter Cristina delos Reyes told Rappler in an interview.
The athletes affected are proudly living up to their Fighting Maroon name, choosing to push forward with positivity. In addition to wanting to make Rogie proud, both Kali and Marie cite the issues with the Track Oval as one of their main motivations to do well that season.
“We just wanted to show that we were worth the investment,” Kali said.
Indeed, six members of the WFT — among them, Marie — proved that no efforts would go to waste, when they were recently called up to try out for the National Team set to represent the Philippines in the AFC Women’s Asia Cup qualifiers in Tajikistan in April this year. The selected Booters are currently busy training with the National Team for the event.
“This whole experience so far has been exciting and tiring. Everything that I have been learning from the training sessions I can also bring it back to UP and help improve my personal game,” Marie said.
Aside from being a personal achievement, Marie cites the call ups as a good thing for the team: players learn various tips and tricks to bring back to the team and help with their plans next season.
Despite being defending champions, the UP WFT shares the bottom two tied with Far Eastern University, with three more games remaining in Season 79. Meanwhile, UP MFT is looking to go back-to-back with just two points behind season-leader Ateneo de Manila University.
The Long Road Ahead
The Philippine Collegian reported in November 2016 that the Track Oval’s rehabilitation will be completed by March or April 2017. However, the current field looks to be far from completion, and neither the athletes nor the student body have been given any updates.
Thankfully, it looks as though regular construction on the field has finally resumed, though there have yet to be any announcements on when the field can finally be of use.
Despite what seem to be insurmountable drawbacks, the UP WFT and all other Atleta ng Bayan continue to give their all in playing for and representing the university with honor and excellence. These teams and individuals may not have all the resources they badly need, but what they do have is the entire Maroon community rallying behind them.
According to Marie and Kali, the administration has begun approving reimbursements for the athletes’ expenses. And while these don’t make up for everything the players have spent over the last year and a half, it’s certainly a start.
Calling themselves “a ragtag group of nameless and faceless UP alumni,” the nowheretogobutUP Foundation, Inc. has also been one of the UP Varsity Program’s biggest supporters — initiating fundraising activities and merchandise sales to help provide teams with their basic needs and equipment. The organization has recently helped acquire the Unity Bus and Fighting Maroons Coaster, shuttle services to help transport the different teams.
The student community is also doing its part to show the Iskolar-Atleta its support, in more ways than simply attending games. In April, the College of Human Kinetics Student Council will be holding AtleTakbo, a fundraising event with all proceeds going towards the university’s varsity teams.
Relatively few UP Diliman students will ever need to play in the UP Track Oval — it’s easy to be seen simply as an area varsity teams use for practice. However, the issue surrounding this 2.9-hectare plot of land extends far beyond the student-athlete community.
The University of the Philippines takes pride in its student-athletes: they may not always come out on top, but they never go down without a fight. This is why the support the Diliman community extends to its athletes is not simply the support of a fan to its favorite team — it’s the support of a fellow Iskolar ng Bayan, reminding our athletes to keep the Fighting Maroons spirit burning, that they are not alone.
The journey to better student-athlete welfare is far from over, but with the cheers and support of the Diliman community, it is definitely far from impossible.