RP bows to UK in Street Child WC

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines held its own against fancied United Kingdom in the early going but lost steam in the closing minutes of the second half and took a 2-4 loss at the start of the Deloitte Street Child World Cup in Durban, South Africa Monday.

The RP street children, whose campaign is sponsored by British charity Angus Lawson Memorial Trust and under the auspices of the Henry V. Moran Foundation, battled the bigger, heftier English kids to a scoreless draw in the first half, went 0-3 down at resumption of the contest but struck back with two goals to move within, 2-3.

MonMon Elona and Noriel Pideones came through with back-to-back goals to the delight of the roaring crowd. But the Filipinos went on full attack in their spirited bid to draw level, leaving their defense open and enabling UK to score one more goal.

“It’s a pretty good score. I don’t think you can find a Philippine team that can come up with as good a score against an English squad. We’ll just keep praying for our team,” said Danny Moran, president of Moran Foundation.