Under the guidance of coach Hoang Anh Tuan, it has been a long time since fans have seen Tien Linh so dangerous in attack. Binh Duong reached the top of the V.League table without a foreign striker. They had Tien Linh scoring 6 goals, that was enough.
The player born in 1997 moved flexibly, was not afraid of collisions and showed sharpness in each of his finishing moves. If he had not missed the penalty against Hoang Anh Gia Lai, 7 goals would have been enough for Tien Linh to maintain his monopoly in the race for the Golden Boot title.
Despite the controversy in recent seasons, Tien Linh is still the brightest choice that Kim Sang-sik has at his disposal. None of the strikers in the Vietnamese team has shown a good enough goal output.
Van Quyet - a very good player has retired from the national team. Van Toan has not recovered from his injury. Dinh Bac, Quoc Viet, Thanh Nhan or Vi Hao have not been able to bring confidence. To some extent, Tuan Hai is still active and strong, but he is "in reverse gear" with the poor performance of Hanoi club.
In recent days, football fans have been constantly mentioning Nguyen Cong Phuong. The striker born in 1995 scored 3 goals in 3 matches for Binh Phuoc. With such statistics, of course Cong Phuong is on the watch list of the Korean coach.
But for those who directly watched the matches of the Southern team, it is difficult to feel secure with the performance of Nguyen Cong Phuong. Against the Ho Chi Minh City Youth Team, he scored in the 5th minute but was dim in the remaining 53 minutes. Against Hoa Binh, Cong Phuong "turned off the lights" against the young players of the Northwest team.
Next, Cong Phuong scored a double in the match against Khanh Hoa. However, apart from those two shots, it was impossible to find any other situations where Cong Phuong handled the ball well, dribbled the ball, or created a breakthrough, contributing to the overall play.
Don't forget that Vietnam's opponents in the AFF Cup 2024 are not as "soft" as the players in the National First Division.
Over and over again, coach Kim Sang-sik still only has Tien Linh. Now is the time for the Vietnamese team to build a playing style around this player instead of Quang Hai or Hoang Duc.
