Philippine national men’s football team head coach Albert Capellas admitted things could have gone differently after their 1-1 draw against Vietnam last Wednesday in the ASEAN Mitsubishi Electric Cup match at the Rizal Memorial Football Stadium.

Capellas said fatigue came into play in added time as to why they couldn’t hold on to a 1-0 lead.

After a 1-0 lead by the Philippines thanks to a 68th minute tap-in goal from Jarvey Gayoso, Vietnam forced a draw when Doan Ngoc Tan scored a header in the seventh minute of added time.

“Today was a different game. Today was a 50-50 game. It was more of a battle,” Capellas said.

“We have to keep longer ball possession because when we put five passes between lines, we shouldn’t have lost, if we could do that in the last five to seven minutes, we shouldn’t have lost. We are tired but they gave whatever they can.”

With this latest draw, the Philippines slipped down to fourth place in Group B after its third draw in as many games.

The Filipinos now need to win their match against Indonesia on 21 December at the Manahan Stadium in Surakarta, Indonesia in hopes of making it into the semifinals for the first time since 2018.

Not only that they will also have to pray Vietnam gets a win or draw against Myanmar, which is in third place with a 1-1-1 win-draw-loss record, on the same day.

Despite the win slipping away, Capellas still has the backs of his players after ending the country’s 12-year losing streak to the Vietnamese.

“I never will blame a player for a mistake. Never. All of them have my hundred percent support,” Capellas said.

“A player who does not play is a player who does not commit a mistake. Football is a game of mistakes.”

Philippine Football Federation president John Gutierrez also lauded the squad for pushing the Vietnamese to their limits.

“As I’ve said on Tuesday, this will be a 50-50 game. This has not been the case against Vietnam since our peak years in terms of world ranking,” Gutierrez said.

“Now that we are coming in at world number 149, it is astounding for us not only to draw against Vietnam, but to battle them possession by possession.”