New Season of Philippines Football League Gets a New Broadcaster?

March 1, 2018

THE PHILIPPINES FOOTBALL LEAGUE is getting a new broadcasting home?

This is how Gab F. Hernandez observed as he captured the Cignal’s electronic program guide (EPG) in the wee hours of this morning.

Rumor has it that PFL will kick its new season this Friday (March 2) at 12 noon on ZTV 33, marking the first-ever national soccer coverage of the network and also this Saturday (March 3) on AksyonTV, marking the return of national soccer coverage since its predecessor, United Football League (UFL).

Recall that PTV didn’t last the half of the first round of the regular season last year– no thanks to prioritizing President Rodrigo Duterte’s curse-laden engagements — which led to Mycujoo delegating the rest.

During the intermezzo between the two seasons, FC Meralco Manila dissolved last January 8 after losing both its players and investors’ support while 10 days later, Ilocos United will not show up after failing to secure a new naming sponsor. Last February 6, Kaya FC transferred its home from Makati to Iloilo.

With six teams remaining, the league’s regular season format changed from two rounds of home and away with the finals series (regular: May to November, finals: December) to two and a half home and away rounds but without the finals (March to August). In addition, the PFL Cup will be introduced and will be played in October.

Like most leagues, the defending champions will usually initiate the new regular season. However, in our case, Ceres Negros and Stallion Laguna rescheduled its kickoff match from this Saturday at 4:00 p.m., by agreement, to June 27. Thus, the match between JPV Marikina and Global Cebu at 7:00 p.m. will become automatically the first.

Nevertheless, if ZTV 33 and AksyonTV holds true with the rumor of coverage, we wish them the very best.