Daily life since arriving in Cambodia

I was appointed as Technical Director of the Football Federation of Cambodia in April 2024 and have been working in Cambodia since then. It was the first time I had been to Cambodia in almost 10 years, since I travelled with the Gifu Prefecture U-14 selection team in 2014, and I felt that the cities of Cambodia have changed a lot in the last decade. Phnom Penh has more skyscrapers and many Japanese restaurants. There are also more traffic lights. It is no longer common to see five people on a single motorbike, but four is still common - although I have heard that only up to three are allowed. Also, during the morning and evening rush hours, if there are any gaps between vehicles, motorbikes and tuk-tuks will cut in no time. Some cars, motorbikes and tuk-tuks do not even stop at intersections and I am just thankful that I have been able to stay safe so far.

Activities as Technical Director: Youth Development

As Technical Director, I am responsible for a number of key areas. One of my main objectives is to raise the standard of Cambodian football and gain competitiveness in Southeast Asia through youth development and coach education. With this in mind I travelled around the country from April to June and had meetings with coaches and people involved in youth development and coach education to gain first-hand insight into the current situation, listen to their voices, gather information and build relationship with as many people as possible. The training courses offered by FIFA for technical directors have proved very useful in these activities.

The three main youth development areas in Cambodia are as follows:

・The Cambodian version of the National Training Centre, commonly known as Bati, was established in 2013. At Bati, around 50 selected U15 and U18 players attend school, train and live together. Mr. GYOTOKU Koji is currently dispatched from JFA as Head Coach of the U-18 National Team and the FFC Academy U-18 team.

・Academies have been set up in partnership with schools in 25 provinces across the country. Four categories - Boys U18, U15, U13 and Girls U15 - are active on a daily basis under the guidance of academy coaches in each province.

・The Cambodian Professional League (CPL) teams also run their own academies, each of which provides dormitories and training facilities for players to live or commute to train. Based around these CPL academy teams, the Cambodian Youth League U19 and U16 were also launched this year.

(Other leagues and competitions are also organised by educational institutions and clubs.)

All three of these youth development environments are founded on great intentions and ideals, but they also present challenges.

The number of official matches in the youth age group (12-18 years old) is severely limited, particularly in rural provinces. This may be due to a lack of coaches and teams who are able to regularly support their activities throughout the year. We also found that very few coaches at provincial academies hold an AFC B license. On the other hand, there are schoolteachers who are interested in coaching football to children, but we have not been able to take full advantage of such human resources. Nonetheless, football is very popular among children, and it is common to see children playing barefoot.

Looking ahead

The immediate task is to improve the current situation and build on the current youth development initiatives. After a number of meetings within the Technical Committee, we have come to the conclusion that we need to increase the number of players and coaches and at the same time raise their standards. The slogan is "Quantity first, Quality next."

This is not to say that quality is not important. However, the first priority is to increase the number of players, teams, coaching education courses for coaches (including licences, refresher courses, etc.), official competitions and people who can understand and work with all the technical aspects of the game. We are working to establish provincial leagues to increase the number of official matches, with the aim of developing them into national leagues. We are also working to increase the number of refresher courses to raise the overall standard of coaches and increase the number of coaches with advanced coaching qualifications. We are also preparing to review the content and delivery of the coach education programmes. There is a lot of work to be done, but I am currently enjoying laying out plans for next year together with my Cambodian colleagues.