Winning performance

Samreth Seiha takes a moment after being mobbed by his colleagues for his match-winning performance

If you read my football blog postings, you'll know that Samreth Seiha takes my vote as Cambodia's number 1 goalkeeper. In the past year he's been vying with Sou Yaty for the green jersey, both at club, Ministry of National Defense (MND), and at international level for the U23 and full teams. He's a great shot stopper and Saturday proved he's no slouch when it comes to keeping a cool head under pressure when he took the honours in the penalty shoot-out stage of MND's Hun Sen Cup tie with plucky Koh Kong. It was all square, and goalless, after 90 minutes, still deadlocked after 30 minutes of extra time, hence the penalties. Seiha saved one of the first five regulation spot-kicks, with the score at 3-3. He then palmed away another before grabbing the ball, turning quickly and despatched his penalty kick in the corner of the net and wheeled away in delight before being mobbed by his teammates. A double hero. It doesn't get much better than that. And the first man to hug him was his rival, and pal, Sou Yaty.
Still on the football front, although Kuoch Sokumpheak didn't make the grade in Indonesia during a less than well organized trial last week, we will have a Cambodian player playing abroad this season. It's Phnom Penh Crown's left-winger and national player Chan Rithy, who has signed on for the Royal Thai Army team, who were promoted to the Thai Premier League at the end of last season. He was due to make his debut in their Queen's Cup game yesterday. Rithy, now 27, has been with Crown for the last four years after plying his trade with Khemara and the Cambodian Army teams before that. Good luck to Rithy, who has been one of the outstanding players in the CPL for a few years now.
I took a tuk tuk out to the airport early Saturday morning to deliver Ting for her flight back to Taiwan, via Saigon. She had a great time, her words not mine, and made some friends whether it be the young girls at Tonle Bati or the silk weavers on Koh Dach, so I'm sure she'll be back sometime in the future. Ting is a nurse in Taiwan and left her job to come to Cambodia and then she's off to southern India in a few weeks, her sixth trip there in the last couple of years. Nurses are always in demand she tells me so she shouldn't have a problem getting a job again once her current round of country-hopping comes to an end.

Ting says her goodbyes at the airport

Seiha back in the groove

Samreth Seiha (in black) in action yesterday against his national teammate Sun Sovannarith (18): Pic courtesy of Nick Sells

Although his team lost 3-nil to Naga in yesterday afternoon's midweek Cambodia Premier League fixture at the Olympic Stadium, I was relieved to see goalkeeper Samreth Seiha back between the posts for the National Defense Ministry team. Seiha (right) is a brilliant young goalkeeper, brave, agile, a great shop stopper, in my opinion the best I've seen in the whole of the CPL and his absence from the league campaign until yesterday has been a scandal. We need the country's best players playing regularly to give the new national coach Scott O'Donell the chance to select his best under-23 team for the SEA Games later this year, as that team will form the basis of the national team going forwards. And Seiha is the best. He's still only 19 years old, has been a national team regular for a while now and O'Donell rates him as highly as I do. I hope the stupidity that saw him sidelined for the first few games this season is now forgotten and he, and his fellow Defense Ministry striker Khim Borey, can be left to get on with doing what they do best, stopping and scoring goals. I wrote about Seiha during last year's Suzuki Cup games and here's my article. I would still love him to get some top-notch professional coaching under his belt, and my choice would be in the UK. It would be immensely valuable to him and the national team if he could spend a whole pre-season with a top club in the Premiership, and if I had the cash I'd send him there. I want us to think outside the box about how we can raise the standard of the national football team and if that means seeking a sponsor from the rich land-owning classes here, then so be it. I'm not proud.

Youth has its chance

17 year old prodigy Keo Sokngorn

My discussion with the Cambodia national football coach Prak Sovannara at the Olympic Stadium yesterday revealed a remarkable statistic. I'd previously thought the average age of the Cambodian national team was somewhere in the twenties but as Sovannara went through the list of his 18-man squad that had just returned from Bangladesh, and reeled off each player's age, we quickly realized that his squad was even younger than I first thought. 22 is the average age with three teenagers in the team, the youngest being the 17 year old star of the future, Keo Sokngorn. Sovannara was effusive in his praise for the teenager, who is on the books of the current league champions Phnom Penh Crown. "Keo Sokngorn is a wonderful prospect at just 17 years old. He always gives 100% and has great talent. When I play him I give him the freedom of the park. I have to be careful not to expose him too quickly but he is a player with a very big future ahead of him." True to his word, the coach sat Sokngorn on the bench for the games against Bangladesh and Myanmar, introducing him in the second-half of each game, though he did start him against Macau and the youngster rewarded him with a goal. The two other teenagers are the 19 year old pairing of goalkeeper Samreth Seiha and talented sriker Khim Borey. Both have come through the youth ranks and have been regulars in the national squad for a while, belieing their tender years. Seiha is an exciting goalkeeper to watch, agile, brave and the best in the country, though a dispute with his team National Defense Ministry is casting a shadow over the start of his domestic league season. Borey has already proved his ability as a goalscorer, winning the golden boot award last season as the country's top marksman, but he too is in limbo after his club made serious allegations against the two players in a recent Hun Sen Cup game.

With the majority of the squad in their early twenties, the exceptions are national captain Kim Chanbunrith, who is the elder statesman of the team at 30, whilst number two goalkeeper Ouk Mic is close behind at 29. Pok Chanthan, recalled for duty after missing the international games in 2008, is 27 and Sam El Nasa is 25, though seems to have been playing for the national team forever, having made his debut as a teenager. Sovannara is upbeat about his squad. "With such a young squad that gives me confidence for the future. Players like Seiha, Borey and Sokngorn, all teenagers, have many years to improve and grow in the national team. I would like a series of friendly matches both home and away to strengthen our team as a unit, work on areas that need improving and to continue the progress I saw in Bangladesh. This team can only get better." Amen to that I say. With such a youthful national squad to work with, Prak Sovannara is carrying the nation's hopes forward and its his job to mould that youthful exuberance with the experience of seasoned players, into a force to be reckoned with in Southeast Asian football. It won't happen overnight but the signs are good that Cambodian football is set to end its spell in the doldrums.