In the Philippines, basketball is without a doubt the most popular sport in the country. Some would go far in saying its like a religion to many (which is true in some ways).
A study conducted by Nike reports that in the Philippines nearly 40 million out of its over 100 million total population have been playing or having played basketball, 81% of the urban population claim to be basketball fans, with nearly 50% being avid fans.
Yes you’ve read it right! 40 million! Not even counting those who were based abroad, and the exact number of Filipino basketball fans could be higher than that given figure. The total number of basketball fans around the world is around 400 million, which makes the Filipino hoop fans around 10% (1/10) of the total number of global hoop fans. A staggering rate that lead many around the world to recognized Filipinos as one of the most passionate basketball fans in the world. The FIBA, the NBA and Global brands like Nike all recognizes the importance of the country in their global marketing efforts.
Since Elwood Stanley Brown’s arrival in the country in 1910 and his introduction of basketball to the Filipinos, the Filipino masses have come to embraced the sport as their own.. And they never look back that they even forget who introduce it to them.
Since the rise of basketball during the post-war years, the sport have became like an obstacle for the popularity of any other sport in the country. As basketball’s popularity have left few rooms for growth and development, and few shares in the local sporting market.
As Basketball dominated the local sporting market, it carried along with it the potential investors and potential talents for other sports, as fan interest and resources of sponsors were mainly focused on basketball. This is the reality to face, if one is to develop and promote any sport in the country.
There are several factors why basketball became popular to the masses, we could sum it all up into these two main factors;
1.For one basketball requires little space, no maintenance, only needs a ball and a rim, no expensive gear, and no required number of players for a social game, and basketball carries well across the poverty-stricken Philippines, where it staves off boredom for countless Filipino teenagers.
2.The abundance of Basketball courts in the country. Almost every community in the Philippines had access to countless gymnasiums or a basketball court all across the country’s 7,107 islands. Indoor courts have become central to life in tens of thousands of towns and cities in hoop-mad Philippines. Basketball courts were continually being built in every community either by LGUs or private sectors, as basketball is essentially the community’s favorite pastime. Basketball players around the country had this luxury of having a lot of these basketball facilities at their disposal, while in other sports like football, one would be lucky enough if they had access to play on a public school football pitch, which is usually the only playing field in towns and cities around the country.
Football or soccer is without a doubt the worlds most popular sport. Some would go far in saying its like a religion to many (which is true in some ways). Football has an estimated 3.5 Billion fans, which means that nearly 50% of the globe’s total population (around 7.6 Billion) were football crazy fans.
Now how could this be, that the most popular sport in the world is still largely an unknown sport to millions of Filipinos, when most of the world were crazy about the sport?
How could the sport struggled to survived in the country? When its a multibillion-dollar industry in many other countries around the world.
How could the sport still not gain ground on a significant portion of the country’s population? When the sport have been introduced in the country for more than 125 years already.. In fact it’s years ahead over basketball, volleyball and even boxing, all of which have came more popular sports in the country than football according to recent surveys.
The difficulty of promoting and popularizing football in the country could be attributed in many factors, like the basic requirements of the 11-on-11 game; the number of players required for matches, the number of coaches available, the availability referees and linesman to officiate the matches, the inadequate knowledge about the sport, less media coverage, the availability and access to football equipments like football shoes, and the availability and quantity of football fields around the country.
Urban areas are seen as the most difficult environment for football to progress or gain ground in communities. Football in the country were more popular in provinces in the south were it is less urbanized, compared to the highly urbanized cities in Greater Manila Area where it had the country’s largest concentration of population (around 25% of the country’s population).
It’s especially difficult to play football in cities or the densely populated slums in the Philippines which do not have much space to play, and cities also lack adequate football facilities, while the few available ones have expensive rentals.
However, the conditions of this urban areas are good grounds for development for the sport of futsal, because of the abundance of outdoor asphalt basketball courts, school basketball gyms, barangay basketball covered courts, et cetera..
Like basketball the 5-a-side version of football only needed a smaller playing area and it only required fewer players to play compared to the 11 vs. 11 version, so like basketball it’s easier to organize futsal matches. Its an easy sport to play and easy to implement in the community setting like in barangays or in public schools.
Over the years, the sport of futsal have came to be a fantastic, unique, and exciting sport in its own right. It has a potential to grow into a sport that is just as popular and commercially successful as basketball.
The sport of Futsal had a number of similarities to basketball as well.
Like basketball, futsal is fast-paced, high-scoring, free-flowing, action-packed, transitions quickly between defense and attack and players can both defend & attack. There are two 20 minutes halves, unlimited substitutions, accumulated fouls, and timeouts where a coach can really impact a game with strategic adjustments.
The lack of football facilities won’t be a problem for futsal, as like basketball, futsal can be played in any basketball court, which are prevalent in almost every Filipino community. All futsal players have to do is place two Futsal goals on each end of the court and you can already play Futsal.
The abundance of basketball courts all around the country makes it easier for futsal players or futsal teams to find a regular practice venue or playing venue, and rental fees are way much cheaper compared to renting 11-a-side football pitches.
Given all this factors, we could conclude that futsal, more than football, have much better chances of expanding, developing and gain ground in urban communities around the country. It have better chances of becoming a popular sport in the country as well. Futsal could also be a good introductory sport for new football converts(so to speak), and be a development tool for football.
In this way futsal and football can complement each other and help each other out for there development and growth in the country.
Now the only challenge would be, how to reached out to these communities? Or how to promote the game on this urban communities which are largely considered as basketball strongholds?
Well, futsal have started in the country for nearly four decades now, and throughout its history there have been ups and downs.
But despite this, those who have love the sport have continually take on the challenges on how to overcome all those obstacles, take on the challenge of how to promote and popularize the sport.
Here we pay tribute to those who paved the way for the sport’s growth and development, the contributors from futsal’s past, present and future.
History
The formal introduction of Fútsal in the Philippines in 1982/83 by Adidas
“Futsal” is a variant of association football played on a smaller pitch, it started in 1930 when Uruguayan teacher Juan Carlos Ceriani, created a version of indoor football for recreation in YMCAs. The YMCA spread the game immediately throughout South America and was popularized mainly in Brazil and Uruguay.
In the Philippines, an informal form of futsal was being played as early as the 1960s to the 1980s, which is usually played as part of a cross training for footballers during rainy weather using regular association football rules.
FIFUSA (the governing body of futsal at that time, founded in 1971, succeeded by AMF in 2002) first organized their World (futsal) championship in 1982 and started to promote the sport globally.
At that time, FIFUSA’s founding head Joao Havelange of Brazil, was already the FIFA president, while Adidas funded much of his FIFA programs, as well as being the major sponsor of the FIFA World Cup.
Adidas also happens to be the major sponsor of football activities in the country during the 1980s. Major tournaments like NCRFA Open, Adidas Invitational tournament, the National League and even the national football team (for team kits) were sponsored by Adidas.
In 1982, Adidas held the first indoor football exhibition game in the country. The first indoor football game was played by Adidas Vienna and Adidas Rom held in Rizal Multi-Purpose Arena (later renamed as Ninoy Aquino Stadium), in Manila.
A year later, the 1st indoor football invitational tournament was held in the country, sponsored and organized by Adidas and aimed to introduce the new sport to Filipinos. Seven local teams participated – Philippine Air Force, Philippine Navy, Philippine Army, San Miguel Corporation, UPLB, UST and Ateneo… This tournament can be considered the Philippine’s first organized indoor football tournament. But according to those who played in that tournament, this was yet to be the modern form of futsal that is being played today. Nevertheless this was the introduction of the sport in the country.
The tournament was a 5-a-side indoor football single round elimination series with the top four teams playing in the knockout stage. The tournament was sanctioned by the PFF, and all indoor football activities were overseen by then PFF Secretary General Joaquin Preysler, who would be the driving force behind many of the indoor football-futsal related initiatives from the early 1980s to the early 2000s.
Philippine Air Force eventually won the 1st indoor football invitational tournament.
Since then there would be more indoor football tournaments organized in succeeding years through the initiative and patronage Coach Preysler. Coach Preysler later organized the first futsal tournament (FIFA version) held at the UP College of Human Kinetics Gymnasium, in Diliman, Quezon City.
The renaming of indoor football to futsal in 1985
It should be noted that at that time, the sport was also called fútbol, so it uses many other alternate names like indoor football, mini-soccer or indoor soccer to avoid confusion with the 11-a-side football.. It wasn’t called futsal yet.. During that time, FIFUSA (now AMF) still uses the sport’s alternate names, just to distinguish itself from association football… It was during a dispute between FIFUSA and FIFA that lead to the renaming of the sport to futsal in 1985. In 1985 FIFUSA registered the word “futsal” in Madrid, Spain, marking the sport’s formal adaptation of it’s current name, which was derived from Spanish fútbol sala or fútbol de salón, Portuguese futebol de salão or French as football de salle.
The country’s first national “futsal” team began in 1995
In 1995, Coach Noel Casilao and Coach Hans Smit began organizing and training the country’s first national “futsal” team pool with aims to play in international competitions and participate at the 1996 Asian Futsal World Cup Qualifiers (ASEAN Zone), also known as Tiger 5’s..
Before heading to the qualifiers, the team first played on International friendlies under coaches Noel Casilao and Hans Smit. Composed mostly of players from the UAAP and the Philippine Armed Forces teams, the eventual 1st Philippine men’s national futsal team have drawn (8-8) Brunei in their 1st ever World Cup qualifying match, but loss big to Malaysia in their next match which got them eliminated. But this marks the first time the country played on an official futsal international tournaments.
The high point of Philippine futsal during the 2000s era
Coach Presyler together with Coach Robert “Bob” Manlulo, Coach Hans Smit, Gue David, coach Emmanuel “Manny” Batungbacal, Mizuno’s Lovell Gopez, and Baltazar “Red” Avelino worked together to get futsal organized and established in the country.
In 2000, Futsal was formally reorganized as part of the programs of the PFF with assistance from the AFC, and pioneering futsal patron Joaquin Preysler was assigned as Futsal Chairman.
Coach Preysler with coach Bob Manlulo also attended the first futsal seminar in Malaysia in 2002.
By early 2000s, the sport saw the rised of many strong futsal sides like Kaya FC who won many of these local futsal tournaments at that time. Powerhouse Kaya had players like Armand and Anton del Rosario, Freddie Gonzalez, Aly borromeo, Alvin Ocampo, Mikee Carrion, Christian Lozano, Rely San Agustin, the late Rudy del Rosario among others. Kaya were also one of the strong 11v11 side in the country, and the national futsal team had a number of Kaya players during this years…
Kaya’s Rely San Agustin (later a UAAP commissioner) would later organized futsal tournaments in Manila with Nike Futsal, Adidas, and Puma Street Soccer (2004-2008).
The high point of local futsal came when coach Esmaeil Sedigh was the Head of the Futsal Department or PFF Futsal Committee chairman and national team coach(2007–2012). Led by the Iranian coach and some Fil-Iranian players like Peyman Nejadsafavi and Misagh Bahadoran, the Philippine national “futsal” team had 4rt place and 6th place finishes at the AFF Futsal championships during the 2000s era.
Some of the notable national “futsal” team players of the era were; the late Rudy del Rosario (2001), Misagh Bahadoran(2006–2012), Peyman Nejadsafavi, Aly Borromeo, Anton del Rosario, Chieffy Caligdong, Floriano “Tating” Pasilan, Ariel Zerrudo, Jimmy Doña, Ali Go, Jayson de Jong, Jayson Cutamora, Arnie Pasanibo, Jake Morallo, Eddie Mallari, Jovanie Simpron, Roxy Dorlas, Michael Reyes among others.
Coach Emmanuel “Manny” Batungbacal also put together the first ever Philippine women’s national futsal team which was formed in mid 2000s. The team won the bronze medal in the 2007 Thailand Southeast Asian Games. This was also the high point of the women’s futsal team.
In 2009, at the AFF Futsal Championship, the Philippine men’s futsal team (also called the Muzangs) achieved it’s biggest ever win (10-2) against Timor-Leste, led by a haul(4 goals) from Misagh Bahadoran. The victory catapulted the team to the semi-finals. Although they lost to powerhouse Thailand (the eventual champions), 2-8, and also suffered a heartbreaking loss to Indonesia (3-4) in the Third place play-off. Nevertheless this was one of the high points of Philippine futsal.
Contributions of Coach Sedigh in the rapid Growth and Development of Futsal in the Philippines
Coach Sedigh is known for his contributions in the Growth and Development of Futsal in the Philippines. He had held several Futsal Coaching Courses all over the Philippines under the Philippine Football Federation (PFF) and AFC Level 1 Futsal Coaching Course under the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).
He also initiated the inclusion of Futsal Sports in the Philippine National Games (since 2011), Batang Pinoy National Youth Games (since 2013) for U13 Boys, U13 Girls, U15 Boys and U15 Girls and the more recent Palarong Pambansa (as demo sports 2013), Organized and Sponsored by the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC), Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) and Department of Education (DepEd).
Under coach Sedigh, futsal was considered one of the fastest rising sports in the country and the country’s men’s futsal team has risen to No. 88 in the world(now the Philippine national “futsal” team is unranked in around 170 national teams).
Coach Sedign also formed the PFL (Philippine Futsal League) in 2009. The league would be the top-flight futsal league in the Philippines, and is organized by the Futsal Committee of the Philippine Football Federation, headed by Coach Sedigh himself.
At its height, the league had around 16 men’s teams (in two divisions) and eight teams in the women’s. For the most part of its short history, the Philippine Futsal League was largely dominated by Fil-Iranian club Pasargad FC led by Fil-Iranians and Iranian expats, one of whom was long time Philippine resident Hamed Hajemedi, who still actively plays for local club Mendiola FC..
Growing pains
After some initial success and the sport’s rapid growth in the 2000s, the sport had experienced some setbacks. The sport continues to faced difficult challenges in growing futsal in the community largely due to lack of financial aid and sponsorship, the constant struggle by the federation to find local sponsorships from the private sector to cover development needs, the mismanagement by some, as well as sports politics within, then the unavoidable inadequate knowledge about the sport and the continuing struggle to popularize the sport in the country…
In 2009 a crisis also arose within and it affected mainly the women’s national futsal team. Coach Batungbacal who led the women’s futsal team to a bronze medal finish, was sacked from his position for allegedly sending an unsanctioned squad to futsal competition or his lack of a coaching license, all accusations which he denied and later proved untrue. This incident eventually lead to the resignation of national players (all of those who played under Batungbacal) from international duty as protests.
Due to all these factors, Philippine futsal have experienced a gradual decline by the 2010s, most notably in the international stages were the national futsal team suffered heavy losses in recent years.
Philippine futsal is currently unranked in the Futsal World Rankings in around 170 member nations, which is a far cry after being previously ranked No. 88 in the world.
Meanwhile, the Philippine Futsal League, having the best intentions to promote the sport in the country, could not sustained after a few seasons. Although the league was considered professional, it was in reality semi-amateur. Fans hardly attended the games, and with no sponsorship and low fan engagement, it eventually folded after its 2016 season. PFL championships were last won by Enderun Titans for men’s division and OutKast in the women’s division.
Efforts by various groups to revived the sport
There have been many efforts by various groups to revived the sport and regain its losses… Steps have been made over the past few years and there have been some gains and developments already.
The Philippine Football Federation, in conjunction with futsal supporter, the Henry V. Moran Foundation, have made huge strides in the last couple of years to not only increase the profile of futsal, but to become a regional power. The PFF has also started promoting futsal in public schools together with partners like the Moran Foundation and the Department of Education.
The Pilipinas Futsal Association (PFA)
In 2010, coach Xarex “Rex” Velasquez together with Joy Dimacali and Eric Manalili created the Pilipinas Futsal Association (PFA), with blessing from the Futsal Committee of the Philippine Football Federation (PFF)…
Mainly focused on grassroots development of the youth in various barangays, the PFA established the Pilipinas Futsal Academy and organized futsal tournaments at different levels & ages including, City, Regional & National competitions.
They held a number of Futsal tournaments, such as Pilipinas Futsal Cup Winners Cup (PFCWC), Luzon Premier Futsal League (LPFL), Pilipinas Futsal Collegiate Champions League (PFCCL), Philippine Inter School Futsal Cup (PISFC) for Elementary, High School, College and the PFA Youth Futsal Cup. They also organized the National Futsal championship tournaments, which included teams from Cebu and Davao.
Most of these tournaments were held meanly in Luzon areas like Subic, Pangasinan, Naga City and NCR (and nearby provinces). The efforts of Pilipinas Futsal Association (PFA) in promoting and popularizing futsal in the country still continues to this day.
Contributions of the Henry V. Moran Foundation
Another key futsal stakeholder is the Henry V. Moran Foundation, a private foundation that helps support the PFF with its futsal development programs. Under it’s visionary chairman Danny Moran (a former national team player, a La Salle Sports Hall of Famer, the original Red Ribbon Bakeshop owner and current Amici Italian restaurant owner) in collaboration with the Philippine Football Federation made extensive efforts to bring the game of futsal to public schools with the help of the Department of Education.
In 2005, Danny Moran have already helped setup and founded Gawad Kalinga’s first sports development program called the Gawad Kalinga Red Ribbon street football program (GK SipaG) with Coach Preysler as first coach and tournament organizer. The GK SipaG made the program as a tool for social inclusion and development of marginalized GK youth. It served highly marginalized slum youth living in the streets of Metro Manila.
In 2008, the program initiated the first youth street football league in the Philippines, where teams from GK communities play home and away against each other in a 5-month competition, the longest running youth league in the country.
By the early 2010s, through Roberto Mayorga’s (Chilean Ambassador to the Philippines from 2010 to 2014) initiatives and with partnerships to Danny Moran of the Moran Foundation, Team Socceroo, and the University of Asia & Pacific, a futsal tournament called “Ambassador’s Cup” was set up.
Organized by the University of Asia and the Pacific in collaboration with Team Socceroo Football Club and The Henry V. Moran Foundation, the Cup competition became a community outreach activity with aims to foster in children values formation and belief through their participation in the beautiful game of football. The participating teams were composed of children from the less-privileged areas in Metro Manila, while it also took on a World Cup feel with different embassies joining in and adopted their community team for the competition.
The success of the Ambassador’s Cup led to Moran wanting to bring the game of futsal to public schools with the help of the Department of Education.
The Moran foundation, together with the Department of Education implemented a successful futsal for public schools program called “Liga Eskwela Futsal”. Liga Eskwela organizes futsal awareness activities in public schools all over the country. It aims to train PE teachers to conduct futsal activities in their schools, and organize festivals and school league competitions between various schools. From 11 public schools in 2015, this program in two years grew to over 300 schools in 7 regions across the Philippines.
As of 2020, over 500 public schools (298 in Metro Manila) spread across seven regions in the Philippines were playing futsal largely through the efforts of Danny Moran and the Henry V. Moran Foundation’s (Moran Foundation) “Liga Eskwela Futsal” program.
In 2016, the Department of Education made futsal an official sporting activity in the Palarong Pambansa (National School Games) for high school girls and this lead to a massive uptake in female participation in futsal all over the country. In the Philippine public school system, women’s futsal is prioritized over women’s football.
Philippine Futsal under Michael Kevin Goco
In 2018, the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) brought futsal into the U13 and U15 age categories for the National Youth Games for both boys and girls. The National Youth Games do not have football as an event, but they opted to prioritize futsal over football.
Also in 2018 marks the entry of international insurance provider Allianz in the local futsal scene. Allianz, which is a major sponsor for football in other countries, decided to support futsal in the Philippines by organizing the country’s first National Youth Futsal competition for U14 and U16 boys and girls. The Allianz Youth Futsal Invitational were held in eight regions across Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao that complements Palarong Pambansa with tournaments. Allianz pump resources into funding all those youth competitions that promote futsal, which is another lifeline for the growth of the sport in the country.
All these recent strides and major developments of local futsal were overseen by current PFF Futsal Department Head Michael Kevin Goco, who have been one of the driving force behind the recent developments in Philippine futsal.
With the recent developments, the Philippines now has three major national youth futsal competitions—Allianz National Youth Futsal Invitational, the Batang Pinoy National Youth Games, and the Department of Education’s Palaro Pambansa where coaches, referees, and match organizers can apply what they learn in courses to develop the sport.
The arrival of coach Vic Hermans
Seeing the growth and potential of futsal, the Moran Foundation invited futsal legend and renowned Dutch futsal coach Victor Hermans to assess the growth of the sport in the Philippines.
Coach Hermans first came to the Philippines in 2015 to give Philippine futsal a helping hand and conducted the FIFA Futsal Course in the country. The PFF have looked on increasing the number of futsal coaches and to identify future futsal coaching instructors. They brought back coach Vic Hermans to do coaching courses.
The Dutch coach had an impressive resume both as a futsal player and as a futsal coach throughout his long career. As a player he represented his country 50 times and participated in four futsal international tournaments, including leading the Netherlands to the 1989 FIFA Futsal World Championship Finals where they finish as runner-up to eventual champions Brazil, while also he won the first ever FIFA Futsal World Cup Golden Ball award.
As a coach, he managed 6 different national teams, namely; Netherlands, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Iran, Malta, Thailand, and Indonesia, three of which he led to the Futsal World Cup. He also won an impressive six championships as manager, the AFC Futsal Championship with Iran, the AFF Futsal Championship four times with Thailand, and a SEA Games Gold with Thailand.
After his first stint in the country in 2015, an opportunity came again in 2019 when coach Hermans have no commitments to a national team. The local futsal stakeholders immediately seizes the opportunity and made offers to coach Hermans to come back to the Philippines and do futsal courses in the country again. To their surprise he enthusiastically jumped on the offer to visit the Philippines again.
Hermans toured the Philippines watching the Palarong Pambansa and Allianz games in Bacolod, Cebu, Davao, Iloilo and Laguna. He watched youth players in public schools both in the cities and in the rural countryside. He also visited non-profit foundations using futsal as a tool for community development. He went to regions where there is a history of armed conflict with insurgents just to see how people played futsal there.
He observed and scouted all the youth tournaments organized by Department of Education, the Philippine Sports Commission, the Henry V. Moran Foundation, and Allianz.
After his nationwide tour, coach Hermans was blown away with the potential for futsal in the Philippines given its young population of over 100 million people. He came away with the conclusion that the game has tremendous potential, and that the Philippines is a sleeping giant in the sport.
He have already identified exceptional (but raw) talent that can be molded only with proper guidance.
Not only was coach Hermans impressed with the local players, but he also saw massive potential in the coaches he worked with in the AFC Level 2 and AFC Level 1 futsal courses.
As a result, the PFF conducted the first Asian Football Confederation Level 2 coaching course in the country in May 2019 with Vic Hermans as the instructor working with potential coaches. This was also followed up by Vic Hermans also conducting the AFC Level 1 course later in the same year with the top graduates of the Level 2 course assisting him in teaching.
In 2020 the 67-year-old Vic Hermans had agreed to become the Philippine Football Federation’s technical consultant for futsal. His involvement will kick-off once this pandemic is over.
Coach Hermans is tasked to create a groundwork for the Philippine futsal program including the grassroots level, and lay the foundation of futsal development in the country, and search for grassroots talents that could represent the Philippines in international meets in the future.
The Future of Philippine futsal
With coach Hermans on board, a wave of enthusiasm abounds at the local futsal and football community, given his great credentials, his experience and knowledge of futsal in the Asian region and positive outlook about Philippine futsal’s potential for growth, not only in the country, but also in the international stages as well.
But only time could tell if he could make a Cutillas-Zgoll like effect in the sport like in the 1970s and 80s Philippine football. Or a Younghusbands like effect and achieve miraculous victories that could truly catapult the sport into prominence. Of course everyone who loved futsal would hope for the best for futsal under coach Hermans.
The ultimate target of the program is to have a long term training program to support a core training pool of futsal national teams that will hopefully compete in the Southeast Asian Games, Youth Olympic Games, and ultimately, AFC competition.
Given the recent strides of futsal, the relaunching of the futsal league is a big possibility. Setting up a sustainable professional futsal league that could serve as feeder to the national teams is essential for futsal’s growth and development in the country.
As for grassroots development, together with the support of the MVP Sports Foundation and the Henry V. Moran Foundation, plans were already being laid out in forming a pilot academy (once the pandemic ends) at the Inspire Academy Raya High School for Sports, with aims of training high potential talents who would be identified in local youth tournaments.
Even though the sport’s recent growth momentum have been put into halt due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic (much like any other sport around the world), Philippine futsal is expected to move on to greater heights, like its older brother, 11-a-side football, it is poised to take an even bigger step once this pandemic is over.
There are no magic solutions of course, works and challenges still lies ahead.. But atleast we could say that Philippine futsal is in good hands. Now we could hope for the best in futsal’s future.
