The Philippine men’s national football team will be looking to go out with a bang in its match against Indonesian to wrap up its campaign in the second round of 2026 FIFA World Cup Asian Qualifiers.

National team head coach Tom Saintfiet said they are bracing for a tough fight against an Indonesian squad, whose players are naturalized from The Netherlands.

Both the Philippines and Indonesia last faced each other was last November where both sides settled for a 1-1 draw at the Rizal Memorial Football Stadium.

“The draw was a very good result and even more was possible. After the Asian Cup and during the Asian Cup, already Indonesia showed a lot of potential and improvement with the input of a lot of foreign-born players, mostly Dutch players, playing on a high level in Holland,” Saintfiet said.

“So it can be a totally different game. We won’t face Indonesia from six to seven months ago. We will face a new team who play, who talk the same language, who know and come from the same football culture and who showed already against Iraq because we saw the game against Iraq.”

As of press time, the Nationals are competing against the Indonesians at the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium in Jakarta.

A lot of things have happened since the last time both squads faced each other.

For one, Indonesia made it to the Round of 16 of the 2023 AFC Asian Cup before losing 0-4 to Australia and is coming from a 0-2 loss against Iraq last Thursday.

As for the Philippines, Saintfiet replaced former coach Hans Michael Weiss of Germany last February and has yet to win a match in these qualifiers.

Its latest match was a heartbreaking 2-3 loss to Vietnam at the My Dinh National Stadium in Hanoi last Thursday, eliminating the Philippines from World Cup contention and is relegated to the third round of the 2027 AFC Asian Cup qualifiers next year.

Now, Saintfiet said he hopes the momentum from the game against Vietnam will carry over to the game against Indonesia and hope to end their campaign with a bang.