Cambodia National Football team

The team Cambodia National Football team

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The Cambodia National Football team

The Cambodia National football team was founded in 1933 and is controlled by the FFC, Football Federation of Cambodia. The team’s nickname is The Angkor Warriors.

 

The Khmer Republic National Football Team

Their most notable performance was fourth place in the 1972 Asian Cup, at which time (1970-1975) they were known as the Khmer Republic National Football Team.

The team ceased existence in 1975 with the political takeover of the Khmer Rouge and due to the genocide and war did not return to International football until 1993.

The team did not achieve any notable performances since their rebirth in 1993. After a positive start the team gradually lost heart owing to poor results. This may be put down to the years of strife and a male population that had been decimated by the years of war.

Cambodia’s biggest star Hok Sochetra

The modern period saw the arrival of Cambodia’s biggest football star Hok Sochetra who remains the most famous player in the country to date. Playing between 1995-2003 he scored 42 goals in 64 appearances. He went on to coach the Cambodian National Team in 2012, but after losing 4 qualifying matches for the Southeast Asia Championship he resigned.

Since the return in 1993 of the Cambodian Team there have been a total of 12 coaches from 8 different countries, with some coaches being recalled several times as interim managers whilst replacement coaches were found. The most regular coach was former Cambodian player Prak Sovannara who coached the team during 3 different periods (2008-2009, 2012-2013 and 2017-2018). Australian Scott O’Donnell coached for two different terms (2005-2007 and 2009-2010).

Keisuke Honda

In 2018 an International star arrived to help the team. This has shown a great resurgence of interest in Cambodian football. Keisuke Honda who is a Japanese football player with over 90 caps for Japan, and who is a former CSKA Moscow and AC Milan attacking midfield player currently playing for Botafogo in the Brazilian Serie A League. He has been an inspiration to the young Cambodian players and is assisted by Felix Dalmas from Argentina who played professionally in both the Japanese and Uruguayan Football Championships.

Fifa 2022 World Cup

The Cambodian National Team is currently participating in the Fifa 2022 World Cup Qualifiers. In Round 1 of the qualifiers they beat Pakistan over 2 legs to progress into round 2.

Round 2 Group C of the Asian Continent started well with a 1-1 draw against Hong Kong, in which Cambodia led until the equalizing goal in the 33rd minute. This was followed with a narrow 1-0 defeat against Bahrain with bah scored the winning goal in the 78th minute. The third match was unfortunately the biggest defeat of the team’s history, losing 14-0 to Iran. However this result needs to be taken in context as in the 2018 World Cup Final stages

the Iranian team drew 1-1 with Portugal, and lost only 1-0 to Spain in Group B of the 2018 World Cup finals.

The last match the played was a 4-0 defeat against Iraq.

The qualifying for the 2022 World Cup was interrupted by the Coronavirus outbreak with the three remaining return matches due to be played against Bahrain, Iran and Iraq during the summer of 2020 to be rescheduled for a later date.