Mae Cadag is really having a hot tournament for the Philippine Women’s National Football Team.
The University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigress fired in her second hat trick of the tournament to power the Filipinas towards a 5-1 victory over Mongolia at the Hisor Central Stadium in Hisor, Tajikistan, to clinch their third straight win in the first round of the 2020 AFC Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament.
Cadag struck past Mongolia’s starting goalkeeper Erdenebileg Tsendjav in the 8th, 15th, and 85th minutes of the match. Fellow UAAP forwards Camille Rodriguez and Kyla Inquig also got into the scoring act when they scored their first strikes in the competition in the 60th and 81st minutes respectively.
Midfielder Undrakh Ulziibayar was the Mongolians’ lone scorer today when she converted a penalty at the first half stoppage time at Filipina goalie Inna Palacios’ expense, to dent the Philippines’ performance.
The result leaves the Philippines in 2nd place of Group A with 9 points. As of this writing, the Filipinas are behind their Chinese Taipei counterparts only by goal difference, as the latter has scored four more goals than the former.
Let Dimzon’s ladies hope to clinch an outright berth to the next phase of the competition when they face fellow top team Chinese Taipei at 4:00 PM Philippine time, on November 13, 2018 at the same venue. A win for the Philippines in its last assignment guarantees a slot in the next round of qualifiers, which will be held around the first week of April in 2019, with the host country yet to be specified.
Philippines XI: Palacios (GK), Long, Rodriguez, Dolino, Cadag, Castaneda, Tomanon, Bernal, Lemoran, Inquig, Impelido (C).
Mongolia XI: Tsendjav (GK), Undral, Nergui, Badamkhtan, Undrakh, Orgodol, Altansukh, Udval, Narmandakh, Damdindorj, Delgerzaya.
