New Filipinas coach Mark Torcaso talks about impact of football on kids

Mark Torcaso is aware of the impact the Philippine women's national football team, the Filipinas, has brought to the country's sports history.

After qualifying for the FIFA Women's World Cup and getting its first win in its debut campaign, the Filipinas have put the spotlight onto Philippine football anew.

For Torcaso, who described his coaching style as an open one as he wants to build connections with players, he just wants to build on what has been already placed by his predecessors.

"For the Philippines' perspective, continue on success in winning games," Torcaso said in an exclusive interview with GMA Integrated News.

The new Filipinas coach particularly zoomed in on impacting kids who would eventually be carrying the flag in the international stage.

"You want to be in a position where you are keeping the people interested in watching and more importantly, impacting young girls to want to play for the national team or want to play for a club. That's the impact that I try to have on the groups and that's the impact I want on this national team," Torcaso said.

Why kids?

"The more that fans support this team, the more people want to watch this team, the more kids want to support or watch this team... The only way for this country to get better and keep going is by getting more kids playing," he said.

"By more people supporting, more people getting on board and watching, I'll try and make our team in front of the cameras as entertaining as possible which hopefully gets more people to watch. People supporting more will get more kids to play," Torcaso added.

"Come and support these girls because it's only gonna lay out the next generations to want to watch and play. If we can get that from our fans, that's the best case scenario. That's the dial that you want to change."

Torcaso will be the head coach of the Filipinas in the upcoming Asian Games and the AFC Olympic Qualifiers.

For the Asian Games, Torcaso said the expectations have been made from the successes from the past years as they will try to be as competitive as possible.

The Filipinas will open their campaign this afternoon against Hong Kong.

—Justin Kenneth Carandang, with reporting by Ryan Fenix/JMB, GMA Integrated News