U23 Vietnam established “twin team”: Mr. Park’s “weird” character

For the first time in history, two Vietnamese U23 teams forged their troops in the same period. This can be seen as an unexpected calculation of Coach Park Hang-seo, who is famous for his “shocking” decisions that few previous coaches of Vietnamese teams have made.

The prestige of Coach Park

Won the AFF Cup, won the SEA Games Gold Medal, entered the 3rd Qualifier of the World Cup, beat China, entered the quarterfinals of the Asian Cup, entered the Top 4 of ASIA – a series of successes from 2017 to 2022 with U23 and The Vietnam national team allows Coach Park Hang-seo to enjoy privileges that his predecessors could not have.

U23 Vietnam established 2 teams to forge troops during the SEA Games.

A typical example can be mentioned at the SEA Games 3 years ago. Coach Park Hang-seo suddenly held a press conference just to ask VFF and Hanoi FC by all means when negotiating a contract with Heerenveen (Netherlands) to have a clause allowing Van Hau to play in SEA. Games 30 in the Philippines. Also in the entire campaign towards SEA Games 30, U23 Vietnam At that time, there were 9 gatherings with a total of 80 trained players!

Or at the last World Cup qualifying round, besides the COVID-19 epidemic, the Vietnamese team of Coach Park Hang-seo has focused, trained and competed continuously from April 2021 and lasted until the end of the year. February 2022. Vietnam’s national championships including the National Cup, V.League and National First Division are also difficult to find the time to “squeeze” to compete. Of course, as mentioned, the epidemic factor is also a part that makes V.League give way to the activities of Vietnam Tel, which has to organize closed activities.

Obviously, the voice of Coach Park Hang-seo has great weight behind the scenes of VFF, especially when U23 Vietnam is assigned the target of defending the SEA Games championship at home in the immediate future. The pressure on Mr. Park is obvious, but at the same time, the Korean leader is also created too many conditions. The main proof is the appearance of U23 Vietnam “twins”. On the one hand, 25 key players follow Mr. Park to Phu Tho to prepare for the 31st SEA Games. On the other hand, a similar number will stay in Hanoi to train with coach Oh Gong Kyun. This is unprecedented in the history of Vietnamese football.

The previous story with coach Toshiya Miura had to “clone” to lead 2 Vietnam U23 team and the Vietnamese national team at the same time is indeed inversely proportional to the privilege that Mr. Park is enjoying. That said, it also shows how powerful Mr. Park is to Vietnamese football in the current period.

Mr. Park’s calculation

Of course, creating two U23 Vietnam teams is not for fun. As shared in his plan, Coach Park needs a strategic backup force for the main squad. Because, the 31st SEA Games took place in a very different context compared to the previous congresses. The impact of the COVID-19 epidemic can still pose a permanent threat to the U23 Vietnam team at any time. Therefore, according to the regulations of the 31st SEA Games BTC with men’s football, U23 teams, including U23 Vietnam, will be allowed to replace up to 15 players.

Naturally, with the home field advantage, U23 Vietnam will have the opportunity to prepare a powerful backup force with low living costs. In contrast, the opponents of U23 Vietnam in men’s football this time will have to calculate the details of how many people to send to compete. Obviously, with the condition of foreign land, the average cost of 100 USD/person/day, the U23 Thailand, U23 Indonesia, U23 Myanmar… could not wait to bring an “army” to live in Phu Tho or Nam Dinh in the competition period lasting 3 weeks.

Another aspect made Coach Park decide to create two U23 Vietnam teams in the same period. Because less than 2 weeks after the 31st SEA Games close, U23 Vietnam will attend the U23 Asia 2022. Lessons in the past when U23 Vietnam put too much effort into the 30th SEA Games, leading to failure in the U23 finals. Asia 2020 or the hasty transition leading to a bitter defeat in both the third qualifying round of the 2022 World Cup and the AFF Cup 2020 is still imprinted in Mr. Park’s mind.

And to avoid the imbalance in the concentration of forces in the tournament taking place consecutively, Coach Park decided to consider creating two U23 teams in Vietnam. At that time, U23 Vietnam had a backup with the name Vietnam Olympics will be trained from now on towards the 2022 AFC U23 Championship.

It should be added that in this tournament, coach Oh Gong Kyun will start to replace Coach Park Hang-seo in leading Vietnam U23. Therefore, the 4-5 week training period in Hanoi will be a better opportunity for Mr. Oh to better understand the students as well as convey his own coaching philosophy to the whole team.