National Almanac and Guide of the Philippine Islands (1926) featured an article by Ignacio De Ycaza on A history of soccer football in the Philippines.
In this timeline of football in the Philippines the italicized words are taken from Ignacio De Ycaza's text.
1890s
Soccer football was introduced in the Philippines by English sportsmen, members of the Manila Club, two or three years before Dewey fought the battle of Manila Bay (1898). This sport was at first looked upon with a great deal of suspicion by the Filipinos, who considered football as the gamboling of half-mad foreigners.
But a few members of the younger generation, being highly imitative by nature, very soon began to follow, as closely as possible, the principle or fundamental ideas of the game. …As there were not enough players in the entire city to form two regular teams, they were forced to practice by matching the fire forwards against five members of the defensive line of the same team.
Some boys that had been sent to college in Hong Kong, China, returned home and taught their friends a little bit about the fine game of soccer or association football. (Within) a year more there were two or three embryonic soccer teams in Manila...
(1898)...The Spanish-American War broke out, and those two or three little football teams were disbanded and scattered to the four points of the compass. The heads of the different families to which these boys belonged decided to abandon the city, either to save themselves and their families from the bombardment they expected at any moment, or to cast their lot with the Filipino troops outside the city limits.
1900s
1900s
When peace reigned again, and the Americans began to inculcate in the Filipinos their love for all athletic games and sports, these first football teams, whose members had by this time passed from childhood into adolescence, were reorganized and trained.
Five or six athletic clubs sprang up almost over night. Among them were the Manila Sporting Club, the Paris Club, and the Manila Jockey Club. These organizations specialized in soccer and actually came to play a very creditable game. (On of these was)…the Sandow football team (which) came into existence in 1906 with some promising new players …
The first official football match in the Philippines was held in Manila on the 15th of October, 1907, in celebration of the opening of the Philippine Assembly. The trophy for this contest, a beautiful silver cup donated by the Hon.William H. Taft (later President of the USA), then Governor-General of these islands, was won by the Sandow team; which developed into the Sandow Athletic Club in 1909, and branched out into further athletic activities.
1906 Manuel Amechazzura plays for Barcelona. He is believed to have been the club's first paid player.
1907 Philippine Football Federation (PFF): Founded, the first in Asia.
1910s
1906 Manuel Amechazzura plays for Barcelona. He is believed to have been the club's first paid player.
1910s
In 1910 the Bohemian Sporting Club was organized and began to train football players with such ability that in a couple of years’ time it became one of the most formidable Filipino soccer teams in the islands, and the most dangerous rival of both the English team called the Nomads, and the Sandow Athletic Club.
1912 Philippines born Paulino Alcántara made his first appearance for Barcelona as a 15 year old .
1913 The Philippines hosted the Far eastern Games - there was a football tournament that was contested between Bohemians (Philippines) and South China A.A. (China) This is often lisred as an International, but Bohemians fielded many non- Filipino players (from Britain, Spain, USA).
More on the Phillipines in The Far Eastern Games here.
1913-18 Teus ( Eduardo Teus López-Navarro) from Manila, plays in goal for Real Madrid.
1915- Juan Garchitorena joins Barcelona.
1920s
1912 Philippines born Paulino Alcántara made his first appearance for Barcelona as a 15 year old .
1913 The Philippines hosted the Far eastern Games - there was a football tournament that was contested between Bohemians (Philippines) and South China A.A. (China) This is often lisred as an International, but Bohemians fielded many non- Filipino players (from Britain, Spain, USA).
More on the Phillipines in The Far Eastern Games here.
1913-18 Teus ( Eduardo Teus López-Navarro) from Manila, plays in goal for Real Madrid.
1915- Juan Garchitorena joins Barcelona.
1920s
In 1920 the Circulo Social Deportivo was organized and produced a football team which rapidly graduated from the junior to the senior category. It kept persistently at the heels of the Bohemian Sporting Club and almost neck and neck with the Aurora Athletic Club in the race for the annual football championship of the Philippines…”
“To further propagate the love for this fine sport and to regulate the football championship contests, which take place every year among the various athletic clubs of Manila, all the football teams belonging to such clubs within the city limits banded themselves together and organized the Philippine Amateur Football Association. This Association held its first championship in 1921 under the auspices of the Philippine Amateur Athletic Federation.
“Casino Español showed interest in soccer football and several matches were played between teams of that organization, to select a team from amongst the members of the club . In 1922 the Casino team and made a very good showing although it could not wrest the championship from the Bohemian Club ...”
