The Philippine National men’s team suffered a narrow 6-5 loss to Estonia in their second group-stage match at the 2024 Men’s World Floorball Championships in Sweden.
The closely contested game, which was decided in the final minutes, took place late Monday night, Manila time.
Estonia’a victory left it as the only undefeated team in Group C, following their earlier victories over Canada (9-3) and Australia (5-3).
The decisive moment came at the 50-minute mark when forward Kim Varga Rosello was sent to the sidelines for two minutes as penalty for tripping, allowing Estonia’s forward Ken Pahn to score the winning goal during a power play. Pahn also scored the first goal of the match.
Rosello contributed two goals to the Philippines’ losing effort.
Despite the loss, the Filipino team kept the game competitive. Forward John Callenryd de la Pena and defender Simon Sicat Laraño each scored to help keep Estonia within reach at 2-3 as the first period ended.
Early in the third period, forward Lucas Werelius’ goal on an assist by defender Ludvig Hemmingberg Porral brought the score to 5-5 before Estonia capitalized on the power play for the final goal.
Philippines defender Simon Andersson, who had been a standout in the team’s opener against Australia, was unable to score in this match, an indication of how well Estonia scouted the Filipino team.
The 15th Men’s World Floorball Championship, which runs from December 7 to 15, features 16 teams divided into four groups. Each team plays a round-robin format in the group stage, with the top two from groups A and B advancing directly to the quarter-finals. Teams finishing 3rd and 4th in groups A and B, along with the top two from groups C and D, will move on to the first play-off round.
Team Philippines needs only to tie Canada in their match scheduled Tuesday in order to advance to the first play-off round. Canada and Australia, both winless until their match Monday, finished their game tied, 7-7.
