At the Laos National Stadium in the opening match of the 2024 ASEAN Cup, the Vietnamese team experienced the most difficult match against the home team in many years.
Before the match, many people thought that the Vietnamese team would easily defeat the team from the land of a million elephants. But things did not go as expected when the Lao team played resiliently in the first 45 minutes.
It was not until Bui Tien Dung passed long that Hai Long shone with a powerful shot to untie the knot of the match for the Vietnamese team. As the match progressed, the Lao team gradually lost strength and could not resist the great pressure created by the visitors. 4 goals were enough for the opening day of coach Kim Sang-sik and his team.
In terms of results, winning 4-0 or 4-1 is not too big of a problem for the Vietnamese team. 3 points on the opening day are still more important than the actual performance on the field.
Even coach Kim Sang-sik was still taking a bit of a risk in the first half. Only when he sensed the danger was near did Mr. Kim bring Quang Hai, Van Toan and Tuan Hai onto the field in the middle of the second half.
The Vietnamese team just got a goal from Hai Long before this midfielder left the field, and then exploded with Quang Hai on the field. The star of the Hanoi Police club had 2 assists, both coming from efforts to steal the ball in the midfield area. Tien Linh and Van Toan basically took advantage of the opponent's mistakes to solve the match.
There were almost no mistakes in the defense. Thanh Chung defended well and Tien Dung and Duy Manh supported the attack well. When Que Ngoc Hai was not present, the task of initiating the attack was done well by these two players.
The opening day of any tournament is always difficult and the Vietnamese team is no exception. Of course, there were many things that could not be praised about the players in the 90 minutes on the field, when many bad passes appeared from Van Khang, Ngoc Tan, Hoang Duc. Even Dinh Trieu made a mistake, causing Duy Manh to commit a foul, and the Vietnamese team received a penalty.
It should be emphasized that the attacking ideas of the Vietnamese team are quite clear. This is different from the reign of Mr. Troussier. But at a time when many players are in poor form, the way they execute their tactics is not good. In addition, the psychological pressure makes Tien Anh or Van Khang become mediocre.
After the victory, coach Kim Sang-sik still has a lot of work to do to welcome the Indonesian team. At least, he understands what he needs to do to help his students improve the situation.
