Vietnam's dream of winning a ticket to the U17 World Cup was shattered.

Coach Dinh The Nam and his team lost 0-5 to Iran on the afternoon of September 25, failing to advance to the semi-finals of the U16 Asian tournament to qualify for the U17 World Cup next year.

The defense continuously made mistakes, Vietnam stopped at the quarter-finals of the U16 Asian tournament.

Iran is a strong team, having won the U16 Asian Cup in 2008. Meanwhile, this is only the second time Vietnam has participated in the tournament, after Van Quyen's team reached the semi-finals in 2000. However, coach Dinh The Nam's students entered the match with confidence. With a low-touch style of play and quick group coordination, the red-shirted team put pressure on their opponents in the first half. Commentator of the channelFox Sportspraise: "Vietnam surprised with beautiful football".

Vietnam created early chances to open the scoring but goalkeeper Ali Gholam Zadeh played brilliantly, preventing the Southeast Asian team from scoring. In the eighth minute, the Iranian goalkeeper jumped up, lightly touched the ball with his fingertips, sending the ball just inches over the bar after Dinh Hai's thunderous long-range shot. In the 16th minute, he saved the team again when he used his foot to block Quang Do's close-range shot.

Despite playing less convincingly, Iran surprisingly opened the scoring when they took advantage of their superior physique to fight in the air. In the 30th minute, Ahmad Jajali crossed from the left wing for Allahyar Sayyad to jump high and head the ball into Huu Tuan's net.

In the first official minute of the second half, the gap was doubled for Iran. From the middle of the field, Mohammad Sharifi made a long, precise pass. Mohammad Ghaderi used his chest to stop the ball before finishing, forcing Huu Tuan to go into the net to pick it up for the second time. In this situation, the Vietnamese defense made a mistake, played without concentration, and no one followed the opponent's player wearing the number 17 shirt.

Coach Dinh The Nam has repeatedly expressed his dissatisfaction with the insecure play of his defense and has spent a lot of effort to correct it. However, his players do not seem to have much change. Hope of a comeback like the match againstAustralia (3-2) and Kyrgyzstan (3-1) in the group stage completely went up in smoke in the 62nd minute. Receiving a pass back from his teammate, Thanh Binh instead of clearing the ball decided to dribble past the opponent, and the ball was stolen. Goalkeeper Huu Tuan excellently blocked the close-range shot ofAllahyar Sayyad but Asad Abadi was immediately there to score the rebound, making it 3-0.

Iran took full advantage of their opponents' mistakes to advance to the semi-finals.

Abadi's goal was a heavy blow to Vietnam's spirit. Coach Dinh The Nam's players collapsed, completely losing control of the game as well as their sense of space, constantly allowing the opponent to threaten their goal. Huu Tuan blocked the opponent's shots many times, but he still had to pick the ball out of the net twice more afterKhodamoradi (69th minute) andSayyad (73rd minute).

Trung Nghia and Huu Thang came on, Vietnam somewhat regained control of the game. However, the team only avoided conceding another goal but could not score an honorary goal. The score of 0-5 remained until referee Hiroyuki blew the whistle for the end of the match. Although they could not enter the semi-finals and qualify for the U17 World Cup next year, coach Dinh The Nam and his team still had a successful tournament, becoming the only representative of Southeast Asia to pass the group stage of the tournament in India.

According to VNE