SLNA Football Joint Stock Company General Director: 'I agree to let U19 HAGL attend SEA Games 28'

SLNA under new head coach Ngo Quang Truong is making an impression with a convincing National Sports Festival championship. This is a spiritual boost for the Nghe An team to aim for the 2015 V-League season, and at the same time once again affirms that Nghe An is the locality with the best football tradition in the country.

Besides being proud of its tradition, General Director of Song Lam Nghe An Football Joint Stock Company, Mr. Nguyen Hong Thanh, hopes that SLNA's youth training will be increasingly improved to produce quality players to serve the local team and the national team.

SLNA has just won the first National Sports Festival championship after 6 times participating, what can you say about this achievement of new coach Ngo Quang Truong and his team?

- I am not surprised by the National Sports Festival championship that our team has just achieved. The reason I say that is because in terms of the participating members, this year's Festival only has 5 teams, all teams use local players, or domestic players who have been playing for the local team for 2 years. In this regard, it is clear that SLNA players are not inferior to anyone else, so from the beginning we set the goal of winning the gold medal for Ngo Quang Truong and his team.

Regarding the issue of Ngo Quang Truong just taking over the team, we are not too worried, especially since Truong is a SLNA player, has played and coached SLNA teams, and understands the specifics of the place where he works.

However, we still give sincere compliments to Truong and his students, they have continued and promoted the glorious tradition of Nghe An football. Hopefully, the championship of the Congress will be a spiritual boost for SLNA to confidently enter the new season of V-League 2015 and reap successes, satisfying the fans.

After more than 35 years of establishment and development, SLNA football team seems to have won all the noble titles of Vietnamese football. Are you satisfied with what you have?

- I am proud of the football tradition of Nghe An, but I do not want to stop here. I personally hope that tradition will continue to be promoted and developed further, especially in youth training to produce many quality players to serve the club and the national team.

To do that, in the coming time, we will continue to focus on youth training and upgrading the coaching staff to serve the task of cultivating people. I agree with Mr. Duc when he said that only youth training can have a solid foundation and can use football to support football. Mr. Duc's youth training model is very admirable, it's just a pity that with limited financial conditions, we can only do so much.

Although we cannot have a lot of money to thoroughly modernize youth training like Mr. Duc, we will try to help the coaching staff attend advanced training courses to improve their skills to serve SLNA. In addition, we will also try to save money to buy modern training support tools to support athletes to improve their professional skills.

In any field, training people is the most important, so youth football training is SLNA's top priority.

But the task of cultivating people is not just to improve the expertise of athletes?

- Of course, youth football training requires many things, as Mr. Duc said, we must put ethics and culture first, then expertise. Currently, youth training at SLNA is doing the same, we pay a lot of attention to cultivating ethics and cultural level for the players. That is extremely important for players, only with good ethics and culture will players not fall when they grow up, good cognitive ability helps them a lot in orienting and developing their future careers.

It is undeniable that SLNA’s youth training is very effective. However, the fact that VFF intends to use HA.GL’s U19 team as the core of the U23 team participating in the 28th SEA Games means that it will reduce the chances of young players from SLNA and other clubs being selected for the national team. What is your comment on this issue?

- I think the U19 team of HA.GL Academy is a quality group of players, a team with many proven good qualities. Emotionally, I, like the fans, really like this team and fully support the plan to let them play in the 28th SEA Games. It is not entirely true to say that using the U19 HA.GL players will reduce the opportunities of SLNA players and other clubs. The selection of the force is decided by the head coach, whoever has good quality and is suitable for the tactics will be called up for duty. I believe that there will be no coach who does not choose to use talented and ethical players.

Only half a month left until the opening of the 2015 V-League season. In the current context of Vietnamese football, what do you predict about the development and quality of this tournament?

- This year, the Organizing Committee only allows each team to use a maximum of 2 foreign players and 1 naturalized player, so domestic players will play an important role in the clubs. It will be a great competition between domestic players, and I think the passion and determination will always be maintained throughout the tournament.

That is also a good thing, and also an opportunity to demonstrate professional ability, helping the head coaches of the Vietnamese teams choose many quality factors, suitable for national duty.

For SLNA, I think that is an advantage in the context of financial difficulties, unable to buy good foreign players like other clubs. In that spirit, I am confident that Ngo Quang Truong and his team will compete successfully, contribute good matches, and satisfy the fans.

Thank you for the conversation!

According to TTVH