People say, reaching the top is difficult, staying at the top is even more difficult. The team from Thanh Nam won the highest tournament of Vietnamese football after 39 years of waiting after the 2023-2024 season left many impressions, especially striker Rafaelson scored 31 out of the total 60 goals the team scored.
And when they became the “team to beat”, coach Vu Hong Viet and his players soon felt the pressure in defending their title. They started with a loss (to Hong Linh Ha Tinh), with the acceptable explanation being that Rafaelson was absent due to not completing the naturalization procedure.
With the new name Nguyen Xuan Son, the player born in 1997 returned to the squad from the second match and had an assist that brought the only goal in the 1-0 victory over Quang Nam at Thien Truong home stadium. Winning, but obviously did not satisfy the home team's fans, because the away team had previously lost 0-4 to Hoang Anh Gia Lai.
And last Saturday, Nam Dinh only had a 0-0 draw at Hoang Anh Gia Lai Stadium, in a match that included Xuan Son, Hendrio, Caio Cesar and Lucas - the player who scored the equalizer 1-1 against the team from the mountain town at Pleiku Stadium last season. A match that both Xuan Son and the foreign factors were locked down.
As coach Hong Viet said, the opponents “all played defensive counter-attacks”, which is both a recognition of Nam Dinh’s strength, but also a warning about their attacking mission. Of course, the opponents already know the “trick” of concentrating the ball for Xuan Son to organize defense and divide, so how will Nam Dinh respond?
Always in motion, like Pep Guardiola has been doing in coaching, Nam Dinh need a new “strategy”, need other factors ready to stand up and share the goal-scoring duties in the context of opponents “understanding their core problems”.
This will be a difficult season for Nam Dinh with early warnings.But there is still time to improve.
