From coach Huu Thang's resignation to the need for VFF surgery

(Baonghean.vn) - It is expected that on September 12, VFF leaders, the National Coaching Council and professional departments will have a meeting with Coach Nguyen Huu Thang to summarize and evaluate the preparation process and competition results of the U22 Vietnam team at the 29th SEA Games. What the public is interested in is who is primarily responsible for the failure of U22 Vietnam?

Being a brave man, Coach Huu Thang only took a few minutes to decide to resign as the national head coach right after the match with U22 Thailand. Bau Duc - a person who bet on the position of Vice President of VFF when the formula "HAGL + Huu Thang" did not bring home the SEA Games gold medal - also announced his resignation. In a peaceful move, Vice President of VFF Nguyen Xuan Gu also apologized to Vietnamese football fans. But is that all?

Close this door

Obviously, if we do not find out the right reasons for the failure, it will be difficult to determine the right direction for Vietnamese football. It is known that in this meeting, the leaders of VFF and the National Coaching Council will also plan the team's activities in the coming period, including the position of head coach in the 2019 Asian Cup qualifiers, the 2018 AFC U23 Championship in China as well as international tournaments in 2018.

As long as there are children who are passionate about football, we still have the opportunity to develop football. Photo: Dung Nguyen

Without saying it, but Mr. Duc's role in recent times has been compared to Chelsea's owner, Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, who spared no expense in hiring the head coach of the Russian national team, spending millions of dollars on the team.

Ba Duc decided to cut down the rubber trees, establish an academy, hire foreign teachers to train the fighting cocks, boycott the Japanese teacher Miura and put Huu Thang - the person he considered most suitable to be the head coach. VFF, in the context of President Le Hung Dung being hospitalized for a long time, had no choice but to silently accept.

In fact, Mr. Duc's way of doing things is simply to raise the level of the national team, not to develop Vietnamese football. People hope that a boss with a personality, using a coach with a personality will give the expected results. That is true, when we face teams of lower level like East Timor, Cambodia... but when we meet opponents of equal and superior level like Indonesia, Thailand, we are stuck.

First of all, it must be said that the HAGL Arsenal JMG Academy is a good training center, but that alone is not enough to raise the national team to the level, especially when it does not train defenders or goalkeepers. In the capital Bangkok (Thailand) alone, Thai football clubs have 13 training centers with similar qualifications. Secondly, Huu Thang is a good coach but clearly has not reached the level of the famous head coach Luis Milla of Indonesia.

When the men's football team failed, only coach Huu Thang and his team and Vice President Xuan Gu stood up to share and apologize. Photo: Internet.

Obviously, it is impossible to skip steps, it is impossible to have a strong national team without a developed football foundation. It is impossible to rely on a few strong clubs to have a strong national team, without a sustainable football foundation there will be no good coaches, good players. If you do not understand that, if you close this door, you will close another door!

VFF Anatomy

If we want Vietnamese football to develop, we must first dissect the VFF. I don’t understand why the head of that organization has been in the hospital for 2 years, no longer participating in management, but people still let it be. People talk a lot about the professional role of Vice President Tran Quoc Tuan, or the role of the head of the delegation of General Secretary Le Hoai Anh before the painful defeat of the team.

In our opinion, this is correct but not enough. The entire VFF Executive Committee, those who are responsible for developing football, must apologize to Vietnamese fans.

VFF owes Vietnamese fans an apology! Photo: Internet

We still need personal imprints, people like Mr. Tu, with a decade of attachment to Vietnamese futsal that has "blossomed and borne fruit". Mr. Tu won and Mr. Duc failed because Mr. Tran Anh Tu developed the breadth of futsal, built it systematically, with a roadmap and full of professionalism.

Our women's football has had good results because our national championship, although not really popular, is considered the best in Southeast Asia. From here, we have discovered and nurtured many good quality female players for the team.

Obviously, in addition to HAGL, we need to develop more good training centers such as PVF, Viettel, Hanoi... to find ways to upgrade V-League to be equal to and surpass regional national tournaments to improve players' level.

Instead of struggling, domestic or foreign teachers, we need, really need to look back at the development process of women's football and futsal to draw lessons. That way, after the failure at SEA Games 29, we can close one door to open another, instead of struggling forever, knowing, talking forever!

AT