The population data in the article was compiled from the Worldometer page on November 15, 2025.
Indonesia Population: 285,721,236 people Number of times attending the World Cup: 0
Football is the number 1 sport in Indonesia. Despite its population, the country's football infrastructure cannot meet demand, leading to a shortage of quality players. Recently, relying on naturalized Dutch players, Indonesia is the first Southeast Asian team to reach the 4th qualifying round of the World Cup in Asia.
Currently, there are about 2.2 million Indonesians living abroad, of which about 1.7 million are living in the Netherlands. The Indonesian squad called up for FIFA Days in October has 15/23 players born in the Netherlands, 1 player born in Belgium, 1 player born in Finland and the rest are Spain.
Despite being equipped with such a large source of naturalized players, Indonesia still failed in the 4th qualifying round of the 2026 World Cup in Asia. If only domestic resources are used, it is unclear when the archipelago can repeat the recent achievements.
Philippines Population: 116,786,962 Number of World Cup appearances: 0
Football is not the most popular sport in the Philippines, it is English football and basketball. Therefore, football is not invested as much as England and basketball, leading to poor quality player sources.
In the early 2000s, the Philippines had a time when they fell out of the Top 200 on the FIFA rankings. At that time, the Football Federation of this country launched a campaign to attract many "overseas Vietnamese" players to contribute to the national team. Therefore, in the past decade, the Philippines has introduced some quite quality English players such as brothers Phil and James Younghusband or Chad Gould.
2010 saw the Philippines reach the highest position on the FIFA rankings in history (111). Also in the last decade, the Philippines won a match in the World Cup qualifiers for the first time. In 2019, they participated in the Asian Cup group stage for the first time.
The Philippines is ranked 141st in the FIFA rankings and was eliminated in the second round of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, earning only 1 point after 6 matches.
They qualified for the first Women's World Cup in 2023, defeating co- host New Zealand 1-0.
Vietnam Population: 101,598,527 Number of World Cup appearances: 0
After integrating and developing the economy (since 1986), Vietnam has just begun to build a system of professional national championships. Compared to economic resources with some neighboring countries, Vietnam's investment in football is still limited. However, in recent years, the performance of domestic clubs has improved significantly.
In 2009 and 2019, Vietnam had 2 representatives reach the semi-finals of the AFC Champions League Two. However, the AFC Champions League Elite arena is still outclassed compared to Vietnamese clubs, rarely any team has passed the group stage.
The Vietnam national team has only had the best result in the continental arena in the quarter-finals of the 2019 Asian Cup. In the World Cup qualifiers in Asia, the "Golden Star Warriors" have not yet reached the 4th qualifying round. Recently, the team's performance has somewhat declined since coach Park Hang-seo no longer sat on the coaching chair.
In 2022, a Nielsen survey showed that 75% of Vietnamese people are football fans, more than any other country in the golden continent. Currently, the Vietnamese team is only ranked 111th on the FIFA rankings, and it is expected that it will take a long time to return to the Top 100 position as under Mr. Park. This shows that the team's competitiveness is still very limited.
Recently, VFF's policy of naturalizing and recruiting many overseas Vietnamese has begun to show its effectiveness as the force in Mr. Kim Sang-sik's hands has become more elite. In the medium term until the 2034 World Cup, Vietnam is determined to participate in the biggest football festival on the planet after its ambition to participate in the 2026 World Cup collapsed a few years ago.
Like the Philippines, Vietnam entered the 2023 Women's World Cup finals for the first time. Despite losing all 3 group stage matches, this success has proven the competitive potential at the highest level of Vietnamese football, as a spiritual foundation for the upcoming tournaments.
