The Philippine Football Federation (PFF) announces the 26-man roster that will represent the country in the first two matches of the FIFA World Cup 2026/AFC Asian Cup 2027 Preliminary Joint Qualifiers Round 2 against Vietnam on Nov. 16 and Indonesia on Nov. 21 at the Rizal Memorial Football Stadium in Manila.
Men’s National Team coach Michael Weiss said he based his selection on player availability as well as the last five FIFA International Friendly matches against Nepal, Chinese Taipei, Afghanistan, and Bahrain from June to October 2023.
Goalkeeper and captain Neil Etheridge leads the squad along with veterans Manny Ott, Patrick Reichelt, Mike Ott, Kenshiro Daniels, OJ Porteria, and Daisuke Sato.
Other team members are Kevin Ray Hansen, Patrick Phillip Deyto, Simore Rota, Carlos Alberto Martinez de Murga, Jefferson David Tabinas, Christian Rontini, Jesse Thomas Curran, Santiago Rublico, Dennis Villanueva, Simen Alexander Lyngbo, Pocholo Bugas, Jose Elmer Porteria, Oskari Kekkonen, Kevin Ingreso, MJ Baas, Bienvenido Marañon, Audie Menzi, Janver Marwin, JJ Melliza, and Stephan Markus Schrock.
“It’s a good mixture of experienced mainstays for a long time and young well-developing talents brought on by the recent performances of Philippine clubs in AFC competitions,” said Weiss.”It gives us reason to be optimistic for our first World Cup qualifier matches against Vietnam and Indonesia.”
While a few players are missing out due to different reasons, Weiss said: “We focus on the ones, who are with us for the qualifiers.” With two Southeast Asian rivals arriving for the two matches, Weiss hopes that the home support will help propel his squad to important results.
The PFF also launched the campaign #StandYourGround #10KStrong to encourage support for the team in the first two matches of the qualifiers.
“A very important factor is the enthusiasm and support of the 12th man,” said Weiss. “We hope the fans come in numbers to the stadium, and be part of history.”
