The Vietnam U17 team has arrived in Japan for training in an important preparation phase before the 2025 AFC U17 qualifiers.
Before the training trip to Japan, the Vietnam U17 team with 28 players gathered to practice at the Vietnam Youth Football Training Center from September 16.
During the 2-week training period, head coach Cristiano Roland focused on optimizing the strengths and overcoming the remaining problems in the playing style that the team demonstrated at the 2024 Peace Cup U16 international friendly tournament last August. In this tournament, coach Cristiano Roland and his team won the overall runner-up position with the result of losing 0-4 to China, winning 3-0 to Uzbekistan and winning 1-0 to Japan.
During the training camp to prepare for the 2025 U17 Asian qualifiers, coach Cristiano Roland also gave opportunities to a number of new faces, notably Vietnamese-American player Maxwell James Peereboom, who is playing for the Gold Coast Knights youth team in Queensland (Australia).
However, due to not having much time to adapt to the weather conditions to integrate and get along well with his teammates, Maxwell James Peereboom was not selected by head coach Cristiano Roland to be on the training list in Japan.
"There are some new faces in this training session and we will continue to evaluate, not just any player. The players must not only adapt to the playing style but also the training intensity. I always choose the best players when finalizing the list," said coach Cristiano Roland.
According to the plan, the Vietnam U17 team will train from September 30 to October 9 in Hamamatsu Prefecture (Japan). During the training period here, the team will have 3 friendly matches, respectively against Shizuoka University on October 3, Shizuoka Sangyo University on October 16 and Tokoha University on October 9.
In 2023, Hamamatsu will also be the training location of the Vietnam U17 team in preparation for the 2023 U17 Asian finals.
On October 10, coach Roland Cristiano and his team will return home to complete final preparations before participating in the 2025 AFC U17 qualifiers.
In order to create more favorable conditions for the Vietnam U17 team to compete for a ticket to the final round of the continental arena and gain the trust of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), the Vietnam Football Federation has decided to host the U17 team's group in the 2025 AFC U17 qualifiers.
The Vietnam U17 team will play host to Group I, taking place at Viet Tri Stadium, Phu Tho from October 23 to 27. Coach Roland Cristiano and his team will welcome U17 Kyrgyzstan (October 23), U17 Myanmar (October 25) and U17 Yemen (October 27).
