Quang Truong and the problem of 'relying on the old and trusting the young'

This shows the... weakness (!) of the team that has participated in all V. League tournaments, has never been in a race against relegation, but is currently in a situation that is "never as difficult as now"!

Coach Ngo Quang Truong during a training session. Photo courtesy of Huu Thanh

In fact, SLNA has to face difficulties every season, but this 2020 season, the team is really facing brain-wrenching problems and the risk of having to "fight" relegation is something that has been predicted early!

That is the difficulty from the main force, both domestic and foreign players. That is the change in the composition of the first team's coaching board. Then the degraded state of the field increases the risk of losing force. Not to mention the attention and support of leaders, sponsors, fans... also begin to decline in the trend of socializing sports activities to dominate, the team's performance results over the past years have fluctuated, eroding trust...

Coach Ngo Quang Truong is breathing new life into SLNA. Photo courtesy of Huu Thanh

So, what will head coach Ngo Quang Truong and his colleagues have to do to "prevent" relegation for the team, in the context that the domestic force only has 1.5 positions equivalent to the national team (Van Duc and partly Xuan Manh), the rest are "old guards" who are only able to play better than 1 round like Quang Tinh, Dinh Dong..., are the pillars "going to the preliminary selection and then returning" like Tuan Tai, Van Khanh, Van Hoang..., are the very "famous" players in the youth teams but V. League is still a sweaty question like Van Lam, Ngoc Anh, Dinh Chau... Meanwhile, the 3 current foreign players of SLNA, although only through 2 matches, have not shown anything outstanding, there has even been a passionate opinion "why not use all domestic players, play with all your heart, who knows?"

SLNA - B. Binh Duong. Photo: VPF

In the first two matches against Saigon FC and B. Binh Duong, coach Ngo Quang Truong's team showed confidence in the results, but also revealed many shortcomings in all three lines, in cohesion, in the game and many other things. There is a quite clear feature in Quang Truong's way of leading the team, if not to say that reality forced him to find a way to continue solving the problem of "relying on the old, trusting the young" that previous coaches have long implemented to different degrees.

Quang Truong is certainly putting more faith in the youth. He believes in young goalkeeper Van Hoang, who is guarding the goal of his hometown team for the first time, and the first 180 minutes show that his faith is well-founded.

In defense, the 3 domestic players are all experienced "warriors" (Van Khanh, Dinh Dong, Sy Nam), able to withstand the "heat" in the first 2 matches but nothing can be confirmed in the future (the situation of clearing the ball into the own net or being broken through the middle is a worrying example).

In midfield, Quang Truong used his two mainstays Van Duc and Tuan Tai to penetrate the defense. Photo courtesy of Xuan Thuy

Meanwhile, in midfield, Quang Truong used his two mainstays Van Duc and Tuan Tai as his penetrating wings, while the blocking and controlling roles were assigned to Van Lam and Dinh Chau, two young and potential players, not to mention the addition of Quang Tinh when it was necessary to "control" the ball and the game!

Currently, SLNA does not have a satisfactory holding midfielder, and it is even harder to find a good attacking midfielder. Being outclassed and unable to develop the ball coherently in the last 2 matches is something everyone knows. If facing a strong opponent, the midfield axis will likely “break” and the defense will be “broken”, with no way to defend…

“Young news” is correct, but SLNA still had to “rely on the old” to get the expected goal and 3 points in the home match against B.Binh Duong (minute 48, Sy Nam took a beautiful free kick for Van Duc to sneak through the opponent’s defense, jump high and head the ball into the far corner of the opponent’s goal). Or the unfortunate near-goal situation in the away match against Saigon FC was also the strange understanding of the two “old” players Dinh Dong- Tuan Tai before Van Duc calmly got down and chipped the ball over the goalkeeper’s head (minute 65)…

The most “characteristic” situation of SLNA’s defensive-counterattacking style in the match against B. Binh Duong was also the coordination between the “old” pillars when Van Duc received the ball from home and then sent a long diagonal pass to Tuan Tai who rushed up from the right wing, followed by a low, accurate cross into the 16m50 area for the “western” strikers (7th minute). Unfortunately, the ball flew up into the sky!

Also being “young news”, Quang Truong let potential midfielder Van Lam “plow” the entire 180 minutes, although everything was not as expected. Also after just 2 opening matches, Quang Truong introduced 3 brand new factors in V. League: Van Lam, Dinh Chau and Ngoc Anh. Surely, many young players of SLNA will be given opportunities when V. League returns.

The long-term, sustainable problem for SLNA starts with "relying on the old and trusting the young". Graphics: TK

After all, in the eternal difficulty of the home team, in the context of not setting high goals, completely without pressure to achieve results, trusting more in the above-mentioned young, ambitious players along with exploiting the battle experience of the "old guard" is both timely and effective.

The lesson of using young players in the country (HA-GL), in the world (Chelsea Club in England for example) has been known by many people and certainly Coach Quang Truong in his return to the technical department of SLNA has "absorbed" that. In fact, that is the long-term, sustainable problem for SLNA, starting from "relying on the old, trusting the young" which sounds easy, but doing it is extremely complicated.,.