Limited resources
2 days after Vietnam's 0-4 loss to Malaysia in the 2027 Asian Cup qualifiers, fans continuously searched for the cause as well as proposed solutions in the hope of changing the situation. The story of elevating the level of strength by bringing in high-quality overseas Vietnamese players is mentioned more often.
Many even expect a "revolution" - similar to the way Malaysia and Indonesia apply to get talent playing in Europe and South America.
In fact, over the past 10 years, the Vietnam national team has called up many names of Vietnamese origin with average to good qualifications. Two of the most outstanding overseas Vietnamese players, goalkeeper Nguyen Filip and defender Cao Pendant Quang Vinh, have been and are in the team's pillars.
However, choosing the next quality overseas Vietnamese player is not easy. Based on information from the media, social networks or especially football brokerage companies, a sad reality that must be admitted is that very few overseas Vietnamese players in the world are eligible to wear the Vietnam national team jersey to achieve the same level as Nguyen Filip or Quang Vinh.
Most overseas Vietnamese players currently only stop at the training level of youth teams of some famous clubs, or compete in low-level tournaments in Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, France, England. Meanwhile, the US is also a place where many overseas Vietnamese play football, but if we consider the male players playing football here alone, they only participate in school tournaments with modest qualifications.
South Korea and Japan are new overseas Vietnamese communities. However, players of Vietnamese origin participating in football are very young or mainly follow the path of study.
Difficulties in many aspects
The number of overseas Vietnamese players competing professionally in high-level tournaments is very limited. Two real names, Ibrahim Maza and Chung Nguyen Do, have chosen to join the Algeria and Bulgaria teams.
According to experts who regularly follow the movements of overseas Vietnamese players, there are 4 most likely names: Kenneth Schmidt - center back of fortuna Dusseldorf; Bung Meng and Bung Hua Freimann currently playing for Luzern (Switzerland national champion); Aymeric Faurand Tourament - potential young striker of Laval (Ligue 2, France).
They can meet the criteria including career maturity, ability to play for the Vietnam national team; possess the ability to play football at a level close to Nguyen Filip, Cao Quang Vinh...
2 of the 4 faces mentioned above have actually been contacted by the V.League club. However, these deals have not been realized due to the expiration of the contract with the home team in Europe or high transfer fees.
That is not to mention, not every overseas Vietnamese player playing abroad has Vietnamese nationality. Some families of these players lack the necessary documents to apply for naturalization. Of course, if they do not return to V.League to compete like Cao Pendant Quang Vinh or Nguyen Filip, it will be difficult for them to complete legal procedures.
Another barrier to developing overseas Vietnamese resources comes from subjective factors. Some cases do not fully understand and accurately assess Vietnamese football, leading to confusion about their own level.
Some other overseas Vietnamese players have language barriers, lifestyle, weather conditions, time zones... In particular, there are cases where when called up to the Vietnam national teams, they are stuck in the competition schedule from their home clubs in Europe.
These difficulties have been going on for many years. The Vietnam Football Federation or clubs can only find a way to remove each knot.
Building a focus process according to the FIFA Days schedule in the past year is a plan to attract overseas Vietnamese players in the 17-22 age group from abroad to try their hand. However, this means that raising the level of strength for the Vietnamese team requires more time, instead of taking place immediately like Malaysia or Indonesia.
