Tradition, identity and 'temporary failure' of Vietnamese football

Along with that tradition and "huge" achievements is a boss with economic potential, a correct and creative operating strategy, ambition and effective operational practices.

Vietnamese football has gone through the subsidy period to socialized football, the time of the bosses is actually not long ago, so talking about the story of tradition and identity is too early. However, in reality, the unique features of each team are gradually formed through each tournament and create different levels of intensity and almost all teams have gone through a period of "temporary failure" with many valuable lessons.

Pham Xuan Manh is shining brightly in the Song Lam Nghe An shirt. Photo courtesy of Xuan Thuy

For example, Mr. Duc's Hoang Anh Gia Lai suddenly became big in the V-League by "pumping" money to buy domestic and foreign players, especially from rival Thailand, but then tried to go up mainly by self-training, with outstanding identity and quality with the generation of Cong Phuong, Van Toan, Xuan Truong, Tuan Anh... Unfortunately, this correct and long-term path has not yet brought real results for the mountain town team when they had to "spend their youth to stay in the league", played well for nearly a season and then surprisingly fell behind. But certainly, Hoang Anh Gia Lai is the best team in terms of media work in the past 10 years and that is a great advantage for them to gradually surpass in the coming time.

Meanwhile,Lam River Nghe Anis the team with the best internal strength of V-League when the youth training center always provides enough talent for the first team. This is a team "of men" who play enthusiastically, passionately, and are not afraid of collision, which is something that the "embroidered and woven" style of play, focusing on technique of Hoang Anh Gia Lai always encounters difficulties and fails every time they confront. Unfortunately, for a long time, Song Lam Nghe An did not have enough financial resources to retain all the talent, causing the identity and tradition of the team to gradually fade away, which is very regrettable. Now, with strong resources, Ngoc Hai, Trong Hoang return, Van Duc, Xuan Manh, Van Khanh do not have to leave, the ability to regain what was lost is becoming more realistic than ever. Not only that, the communication, promotion and all activities of a professional team in formation will double or triple the strength of the team. Hopefully V-League-2022 will be a return to the old glory of Song Lam Nghe An, although there is a long and difficult journey ahead due to fierce competition from many worthy opponents.

In the current V-League, no one has a more glorious and heroic history than Viettel Club - the next step of the name The Cong. But here, there are also sad "gaps" that the army team had to be relegated, had to change its name, and changed its owner, making it difficult and costly to rebuild and regain its honor. Viettel Club won the 2020 national championship, is currently playing well in the 2022 AFC Cup, is a place that provides many national players and U23 Vietnam is the step to affirm the strength of tradition and the present. This is certainly a real "force" of Vietnamese football, thanks to promoting the tradition and identity of the army team, especially when overcoming the subsidy path to become professional as it is today.

HAGL's start to V.League 2022 was not as expected. Photo courtesy of PV

And the last thing to mention is the strong, sharp, high-quality mark of Hanoi FC in recent years. The national team and U23 Vietnam players have their roots in Hanoi FC training, which has been associated with the brilliant success of Vietnamese football, especially since the time ofCoach Park Hang-seo. What is worth paying attention to are the signs of cracks that are worth mentioning when the team gradually lets its veterans leave such as coach Chu Dinh Nghiem, defender Dinh Trong, or most recently Quang Hai... causing the competition results to not be as expected. That will cause the bold features that make up the tradition and identity of the team to fade away without knowing it?

To see, preserving and promoting the tradition and identity of a football team is not easy, it takes effort and time to achieve it, but losing it in a moment and it is very difficult to get it back as before, let alone building it up and highlighting it. Obviously, strong football teams all have to go through difficult stages, hardships, and "temporary failures" in order to gradually rise up. It should also be remembered that the team's achievements are the whole team, but the typical image of the team is that of a few stars. Everyone knows that Messi always shines brightly in the Camp Nou sky, and when he leaves, how everything collapses for both is something everyone understands. Quang Hai is associated with the success of Hanoi FC, so when this star leaves, this void must be filled to have good hope for the capital team. Otherwise, there will be an unfortunate break somewhere, a failure will repeat itself with Hanoi FC, even though no one wants it./.

Phu Chau