Carmona, Cavite — Kaya FC-Iloilo come away with all three points in the Copa Paulino Alcantara’s opening day fixture versus Maharlika Manila. Daizo Horikoshi’s lone goal in the 46th minute sealed the deal, and the defending champions’ season has gotten off to a fantastic start.
Iloilo dominated possession from the opening whistle, settling in early and forcing their opponents to sit deep. The boys took their time picking out passes, content to build patiently from the back—peppering the final third with long balls over top and switching play when need be.
Defensively, Kaya employed a high press to keep the pressure on Maharlika—quickly repossessing the ball to reset and try again. Chances came very often for the yellow and black, and they would only get progressively more dangerous the further the match went.
The ball finally found the back of the net early in the second half. Jovin Bedic sent in a through pass for Robert Lopez Mendy in the box, drawing the keeper off his line to challenge him head-on. The blocked ball fell nicely into the path of a defender, but Daizo stole it away right outside the box and buried it in the empty goal.
With the lead secured, the boys began to play more freely. The build-up and passing went to a whole other level, slicing through the defense and going wherever they wanted to on the pitch. They also started adding more variety to their approach: playing passes through the middle and between the lines, mixing more over and under-lapping runs into space, and clean one-two’s to circumnavigate the backline to name a few.
It was a passing and ball movement clinic, and Kaya created a grand total of twenty-eight shots on the night. If a couple of touches were even fractionally better, the final score would’ve looked a whole lot different.
Four of the five available substitutions were used in this match. Captain Jovin Bedic came in for Shirmar Felongco at the half to breathe some life into the offense. Sandro Reyes checked in for Ryo Fujii in the 66th, Fitch Arboleda in for Eric Giganto in the 69th, and Jhan Melliza in for Arnel Amita in the 78th.
Kaya now have two weeks to build on this and shore up the finishing. Throughout the match, you could see glimpses of just how dangerous this team can be when it all comes together. Up next are rivals United City FC on Monday, March 28th.
