Celebrity Duets Season 2 gets a taste of continental flair with the entry of Phil Younghusband.
Bagamat maganda ang first batch ng contenders for the first season of Celebrity Duets, na franchise ng Fremantle, general opinion ng entertainment press na um-attend sa presscon ng second season ng naturang singing competition kagabi, August 20, na mas maganda at mas dynamic ang current contenders. This is made possible with the entry of two potential hearthrobs vying for the votes of the girls and gays sa pangunguna ng half-English, half-Filipino soccer player turned model na si Phil Younghusband; the other one is chef JL Cang.
Phil's name first caught print as the one of the Younghusband brothers imports to play for the Philippine national football team; the other being James. Younger of the two by eleven months, pumasok naman ang pangalan ni Phil sa showbiz news nang pinilit niyang makipagkilala sa young actress na si Rhian Ramos. Phil still insists that is not a gimmick dahil after their first meeting, he had to leave for England so nothing came out of it that would benefit his career in sports or otherwise.
Phil is 21 years old and, like his brother, was born in Ashford, England. At the age of 17, naka-graduate na siya ng college, majoring in Math Mechanics and Sports Science sa Chelsea, England where he also first played soccer, the European counterpart of football. He and James played for one of the English premier leagues, Chelsea FC Youth Tteam. James later played for Staines Town FC while Phil became part of the Chelsea Reserve Team.
Every year since he was born, umuuwi ang pamilya nila sa Pilipinas for vacation. Three years ago, an anonymous tip came to the Philippine Football Federation that the brothers Younghusband have Filipino roots, so they were invited to join the local team. Since then they played for the Southeast Asian Games 2005 and ASEAN Football Championship Qualifier in 2006. Their patriotism was proven last year when given the choice to play for both English U-23 National and the Philippine Team; they opted to represent ours.
Staying in the Philippines longer than they used to opened the advertisement doors for Phil, who is now the endorser of the Hanford line of underwear.
While Phil admits he loves singing, he only does it in the shower, as he intimated in the general question-and-answer sa presscon ng Celebrity Duets. He was so surprised when he got an offer to join Celebrity Duets while he was in a cafe that his first reaction was to hold the thought muna, pumasok sa comfort room at kumanta sa harap ng salamin, bago niya tinanggap ang offer.
"Then I requested for a karaoke machine where I could practice my singing and , oh, far, it's all 100 [his score] since then!" patawa niyang dagdag sa kuwento niya.
Hindi pa magaling mag-Tagalog si Phil, but he is learning now enough to say "magandang gabi" and "salamat." But what's important, every time he speaks in Tagalog, may "po" palagi.
When asked kung intersado ba siyang pumasok sa showbiz and acting, Phil said he is; but priority pa rin sa kanya ang kanyang sports.
May sariling website si Phil, www.philyounghusband.com.