Bui Dinh Chau: Slow moments of social distancing

The days of the outbreak in Nghe An were also the days when Chau and some teammates implemented a mechanism of playing football without communicating with the outside world. Those were the days of slow living for her, it brought many reflections on the past life to thicken the luggage for the future ahead.

Bui Dinh Chau in SLNA's internal match. Photo: Duc Anh

Slow Living Days

I couldn't meet Chau in person, I only saw her through Zalo screen. Because at this time Chau and some young teammates in the ClubSLNAare implementing isolation according to Directive 16. According to Chau, the first days of implementing the directive were also uncomfortable, because usually after the first morning practice, the team members would walk together to breathe in the bustling air of the city. Then, they would drink a cup of coffee and chat about football or personal feelings.

Then when the epidemic broke out "wherever you are, stay there”, Chau also had to get used to the new lifestyle. As usual, Chau's dawn starts at 5am, but this time Chau did not go out to the field with his teammates, but instead went to the club's gym to practice physical strength and fitness. Although the coaching staff does not require the players to practice regularly these days, in order to maintain their endurance and flexibility, the Nghi Loc player still practices diligently every day, so that when the tournament returns, he can catch up immediately. The training process in the gym also helps Chau supplement the steel of a defensive midfielder, a very necessary factor for confrontational disputes. Chau said: "I myself am not a person with a strong physique, so in order to have a thicker body, in addition to practicing on the field, I have to try to practice and increase my muscles. So, taking advantage of these days off, I have to try to practice gym so that when I return to the field, I will have better physical strength and a firmer body to master the midfield area".

Bui Dinh Chau always gives his all every time he is on the field. Photo: Duc Anh

After hours of physical training, finding hobbies to make life more meaningful during the days of social distancing is essential for young people like Chau. And the hobby that midfielder Bui Dinh Chau feels is meaningful to him is finding books. Those books not only make time pass faster each day, but they also bring useful things to life as well as in-depth knowledge of the king sport.

Chau shared: “These days are really slow days for me, to see that besides football, I also need other experiences such as reading books or going online to find good stories, stories about humanity in the fight against the pandemic. Reading books is also a way to supplement my philosophy of life to make me look towards more positive things in the future.”

Time passes by very quickly for Chau. Late afternoons are the time for the young midfielder to play his favorite sports. Playing netball or table tennis always brings laughter to Chau and his teammates.

Bumpy search for success

Returning to the football career of young midfielder Bui Dinh Chau. This player from Nghi Loc, born in 1996, came to the football environment quite late. Normally, to become a professional player, athletes must join the youth training center of SLNA at the age of 10 or 11. However, for Chau, it was not until he was 15 that he started to enter the training center of the Nghe An team.

“When I was in my hometown, I loved playing football. There was not a day that I did not gather with the children in the village to play football. But I did not think that I would pursue a professional football career. It was only when my uncle saw that I had some talent that he introduced me to coach Ky Phuong at SLNA Club. When I came to take the test, he immediately recognized my potential and recruited me into SLNA’s youth team,” Chau recalled.

Bui Dinh Chau practices with his teammates at SLNA. Photo: Duc Anh

Entering the "oven" late, Chau encountered many difficulties because he had to start honing the basic playing style of a professional player. To keep up with his teammates, Chau had to spend more time practicing than his friends. That hard work helped Chau score points with Coach Quang Truong. The sweet fruit came to Chau in 2012 when he and his teammates at SLNA won the national U17 championship. In that tournament, Chau was always in the team's starting lineup. With his aggressiveness, not afraid of collisions and good "card dealing" ability, he demonstrated his leadership role in SLNA's midfield. Bui Dinh Chau's team that year had an extremely excellent performance when defeating all opponents and reaching the pinnacle of glory. Bui Dinh Chau, with his impressive performance at the tournament, was voted the best player of the tournament.

In the following years, Chau continued to play very well and made many contributions to SLNA's youth teams. However, he was still not called up to the club's first team. At that time, the Nghe An team had too many talented players playing in the same position as him, such as Van Binh, Khac Ngoc, Hoang Thinh... Therefore, Chau had to look for opportunities to play in smaller teams to gain more experience.

That period was really a bumpy time for the young midfielder from Nghi Loc. He went through many different clubs from the second division to the first division. It was only when the senior midfielders at SLNA Club left that Chau was called back by his old teacher Quang Truong to strengthen the midfield for the yellow shirt team. From here, a new page was opened for the young midfielder Bui Dinh Chau. With what he had accumulated from the teams Chau had participated in before, along with his confidence, he quickly integrated into the playing style of the Nghe An team.

Bui Dinh Chau plays in the match between Hanoi and SLNA in V.League 2020. Photo: VFF

The match that Chau remembers the most is the match where she and SLNA played extremely well against the home team Hanoi FC in 2020. This was a match where SLNA was considered a much weaker team than the defending champion. However, with the resilience of the whole team, SLNA won away from home. “Until now, I still remember the moments in that match clearly. Because SLNA took the field with a series of very young players. The opponents were star players in the V.League, so when entering the match, we were determined to fight with all our youth. When facing players like Van Quyet, Quang Hai, Hung Dung... I was a bit apprehensive. However, when entering the match, I put those thoughts aside and played football with enthusiasm and alertness. We covered, followed and counterattacked very well, surprising the home team. And the final result was that we won,” Chau recalled.