Coach Huy Hoang's hair turned gray in his first year in charge of V.League

Great Expectations

The first year of Coach Huy Hoang's coaching was under the conditions of "heavenly time, favorable location, and harmony of people" when SLNA had the support of sponsor Tan Long, and the return of great players such as Trong Hoang, Que Ngoc Hai and many other players at their peak such as Van Duc, Xuan Manh, Van Hoang. Along with that was the great expectation of Nghe An fans.

Although the club's leadership created the best conditions to find personnel, Coach Huy Hoang's calculations all failed for many different reasons:

Firstly, “rookie” Trong Hoang suffered a long-term injury and could not play. This is a huge loss because Trong Hoang is a very important link in the scheme and playing style that coach Huy Hoang will build. Thus, only Ngoc Hai and Dinh Hoang are the two most significant additions.

Second, it is the inability to successfully naturalize central defender Thiago to help SLNA have more options in defense.

Third, the new foreign players coming to V.League 2022 are not as good as many years ago due to the pandemic, competition schedule, tournament quality... SLNA is no exception, despite having a budget available.

Coach Nguyen Huy Hoang may not have much experience in his first year as SLNA coach, but a position in the top 5 teams is a success for his coaching career in V.League. Photo: Chung Le

This is the first season of coach Huy Hoang, and also the first year that an important player like central defender Que Ngoc Hai returns after 3 years playing for Viettel. In addition, Huy Hoang also has a headache with the problem of ensuring results while creating the best playing conditions for young players.

To build a unique style of play, you need to have enough good elements and to find good players, you need to have a foundation of playing style. Although SLNA's squad still has quality players like Ngoc Hai, Dinh Hoang, Van Khanh, Van Duc, Xuan Manh, Olaha, on the bench of SLNA, there are not players who can help turn the match.

SLNA’s squad depth is not enough to fill the gaps if a player is injured or has to sit out due to a suspension card for a long race. That is also the reason why coach Huy Hoang is forced to put out the fire by letting a player with good attacking ability like Xuan Manh play in the defensive midfield position.

SLNA's youth training is still good, but the generation born in 1997-2002 is running out of steam. SLNA's U21 teams are struggling, and recent SEA Games and U23 international tournaments have gradually lost young players from Nghe An. Every young player who steps onto the V.League field must not only hone their skills and football mindset, but also do thorough mental work, giving them many opportunities to gain confidence.

Finally, there are factors outside of the professional level that make SLNA lose points in many matches unluckily. Most of them come from referee decisions and 4 unjust red cards.

Looking back at the whole season, SLNA still had 2 good matches, daring to play and attack when facing a shortage of players like the match against Binh Dinh, the away match against Hanoi or Binh Dinh. SLNA was also the only team in V.League that did not receive a single penalty from the referees.

Compare first year performance

If we consider the achievements in the first year leading SLNA for a full V.League season, it is quite surprising that young coach Nguyen Huy Hoang did better than his teachers and brothers, Coach Huu Thang, Duc Thang and Quang Truong.

Since 2010, Coach Huu Thang returned to lead SLNA for the entire season and finished in 9th place with 37 points. At that time, the Nghe An team had quality players such as Huy Hoang, Van Quyen, Dinh Dong, Trong Hoang, Van Binh, Dac Khanh, Van Hoan, Quang Tinh... and average foreign players in V.League.

Coach Nguyen Huu Thang. Photo courtesy

In particular, this is the first year that Coach Huu Thang leads SLNA when he has just received strong investment from the new sponsor NH Bac A. Although he has not yet achieved immediate stability in the V.League, at least at the end of the 2010 season, SLNA has won the National Cup. The 2010 season can be considered a very important premise for Coach Huu Thang to establish a new order at SLNA, then crowned the V.League 2011 and quite flourished in the following seasons. Coach Huu Thang's achievements in the 2012 season were 5th place with 33 points, 4th place in the V.League 2013 with 33 points, 5th place in the V.League 2014 with 36 points.

After the reign of coach Huu Thang, SLNA began to have changes and had a new coach from V.League 2015 when coach Ngo Quang Truong was chosen.

Coach Ngo Quang Truong (white shirt).

In the 2015 season, SLNA also rejuvenated strongly and faced many difficulties because of poor quality foreign players. The Nghe An team only finished 7th despite being quite successful in the early stages of the season. There were still quality players but SLNA continued to struggle in 2016 and finished 9th at the end of the season before parting ways with coach Quang Truong.

The "successor" at SLNA V.League 2017is Coach Nguyen Duc Thang. With Coach Nguyen Van Thinh as his advisor, he could only help SLNA finish 8th in the National Championship with 34 points (8 wins, 10 draws, 8 losses). A year later, with a fairly high-quality squad starting to mature, SLNA convincingly won the National Cup and finished 4th overall in the 2018 V.League season.

Winning the 2017 National Cup was the first mark of coach Duc Thang. Photo: Thanh Cuong

In the 2019 season, Coach Nguyen Duc Thang and SLNA finished 7th overall with 35 points and in the 2020 V.League, Coach Quang Truong and SLNA finished 10th in the relegation group before falling into the relegation group in the 2021 V.League. Thus, the last time SLNA achieved the top 5 was in the 2018 season when SLNA had enough strong soldiers and generals.

With the above comparisons, Coach Huy Hoang's achievements in his first year in charge at SLNA are considered very positive compared to his predecessors such as Coach Huu Thang, Coach Van Thinh, and Coach Duc Thang.

SLNA's achievements in recent V.League seasons. Graphics: Hoai Hoan.

However, Coach Huy Hoang's mark in V.League 2022 is not much, except for the fact that this coach boldly uses young players. Coach Huy Hoang's use of young players, creating many opportunities for them to compete and mature has helped factors such as Dinh Tien, Xuan Tien, Van Cuong, Sy Hoang, Nam Hai... become visibly stronger and gradually meet professional requirements.

There are regrets, there are satisfactions, but coach Huy Hoang himself certainly learned many valuable lessons in all aspects to have the premise to do better in the following seasons.

For a young coach, such a start is completely reasonable to think about a brighter future for Nghe An football.