Deluge of out-of-town booters in Thirsty Cup

CEBU, Philippines — This year's Thirsty Football Festival has attracted more out-of-towners with close to a hundred teams seeing action at the Cebu City Sports Center starting this Friday.

"There are 93 out of town teams which confirmed entry for this year's action. This is the biggest number of participation so far  in the Thirsty Cup,"said Iggy Luza in a press conference yesterday at Shaka restaurant in Cebu IT Park.

The visiting contenders are from Bohol, Dumaguete, Iloilo, Roxas, Leyte, Butuan,Masbate, Tacloban, Iligan, Cagayan de Oro and Capiz.

All in all, a total of 3,150 aspiring booters spread into 234 teams will be taking part in Cebu's biggest and best-runfootball festival.

Interestingly, the figure is fewer than the previous edition since the organizers decided to cut down the number of entries to avoid late night games.

There are 14 divisions to be contested from 7-under to 45-above.

The men's open division has the most number of participants with 36 squads, while the distaff side has 16.

The turnout in the ladies open is also quite overwhelming because only a few lady players are usually interested to join in. (FREEMAN)