SLNA: Maturity and confidence of young teachers and students

The victory in round 3 of V. League 2022 against HAGL and the return to Thong Nhat Stadium, always "covered in gold" by Nghe An fans, clearly gave SLNA great strength in round 4 against Saigon FC, while young coach Huy Hoang became more and more confident on the coaching bench... were the highlights of the fateful match between the two teams on the evening of March 13, 2022.

SLNA match against Saigon. Photo archive

Almost certainly, SLNA's attack will "frame" the tasks for the Olaha-Osenni duo: close to the opponent's goal, run to attract defenders, sweep, use strength when counter-attacking, play the ball and finish. With the addition of Osenni, Olaha can freely play wide as his forte and strangely, the remaining foreign player J. Mark, after the disappointing match against TopenLand Binh Dinh (T. BD), has returned to be a real stopper in the midfield, coordinating well with the remaining players to both successfully block and quickly change state.

It can be seen that the three foreign players of SLNA are increasingly proving the necessary strength to fulfill their duties on the field. The situation where Osenni stole the ball in the right corner, passed the ball to Olaha (the opposing goalkeeper quickly caught it) and especially the beautiful goal in the last minute of the first half at Thong Nhat Stadium proves that.

Van Hoang played extremely well in the victory over HAGL as we know, Ngoc Hai is capable enough to instill confidence in his juniors, The Nhat completed his task excellently when he accompanied the dangerous foreign striker Brandao of HAGL to continue to be trusted and the return of Thai Ba Sang on the day this central defender was called back to U23 Vietnam... is a solid guarantee for SLNA's defense in SLNA's second away match after 4 rounds.

But SLNA also faced difficulties when Xuan Manh had a cold and had to sit on the bench and only entered the field in the second half. Not to mention Van Duc's entry into the field was a surprise when previously there was information that this player had to practice separately due to an injury from the victory over HAGL, after a cannon shot into Tuan Linh's net.

But in the difficulty of SLNA, the young talent Xuan Tien appeared when he replaced Van Duc and this player is truly the hope not only of SLNA but also of Vietnamese football. Osenni's goal was thanks to his unexpected penetration into the penalty area, jumping high to compete with the opponent's central defender, passing the ball from Xuan Tien to Osenni so that this striker could shoot with his instep as if pointing to the far corner, before the helplessness of goalkeeper Van Phong who was very excellent before.

SLNA's very unique combination to score this goal basically repeated Van Duc's beautiful goal in the match against HAGL. The ball was passed from Van Bach's foot to Olaha, this foreign player jumped high to head back to Van Duc and Coach Park's favorite player used his right foot to shoot hard, the ball curved very unpredictably and flew into the net (the goal in the match against the Chinese national team, Van Duc scored with his left foot). That is a top-class striker, able to score with both feet from a very long distance - wouldn't it be strange if he wasn't the "favorite" of the difficult coach?

There are two things to learn: SLNA has been perfecting its playing style, coordinating attacks in a systematic and systematic way, and is not at all… lucky like Basit’s goal against BD in the opening match, even though Basit was extremely fast and dangerous in that situation. Another thing is that while SLNA currently lacks a ball-playing player like Khac Ngoc before, now there is Dinh Hoang, an attacking full-back, who always has “key” passes that open up opportunities, are highly lethal, and the two passes just mentioned convincingly prove that.

Not only Xuan Tien was steady in nearly 75 minutes on the field, similar to Khac Luong in the match against T.BĐ, other young players such as Sy Hoang, Van Viet or Manh Quynh, Van Cuong in this match also created great confidence in the eyes of the coaching staff and fans. Obviously, SLNA's domestic players are always abundant, never exhausted. The problem is how coach Huy Hoang will use them to create stable and long-term effectiveness.

Another thing to say about the "young" in this nerve-wracking match is the young coach Huy Hoang. After the lesson in the reverse loss to T.BĐ at home, this former steel center back has learned a useful lesson by not rushing to attack and then being defeated by the opponent's quality foreign players. Dinh Hoang played very well in all 4 matches, was the best attacker but that meant he would be counter-attacked when he went up high, and would run out of breath when defending. Do Melo's equalizer in the match against Saigon FC made Huy Hoang more cautious than ever when the opponent was hiding cards to surprise the army that was enthusiastically attacking with the enthusiastic cheers of the audience. This time Huy Hoang advocated playing discreetly, keeping the right distance between defense and counter-attack and as he said after the match "1 point is also a success" must have been in that sense?

Congratulations to SLNA for a successful start and lessons learned through the opening 4 rounds. “The beginning is good” - so to speak for SLNA and Huy Hoang. Hopefully, “the end will be good” for SLNA and Huy Hoang’s goal of finishing in the top 3 in the fierce race during the hot season, from July.