Opponents rarely use naturalized players, Vietnamese football ranks first in Southeast Asia

Consecutive titles of Vietnamese football

The Vietnamese team lost to the Indonesian naturalized players in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers in Asia. We lost to the Malaysian naturalized players in the 2027 Asian Cup qualifiers. However, when the aforementioned teams and teams in Southeast Asia in general do not use many naturalized players, they cannot prevent the Vietnamese teams from winning regional tournaments.

Photo: Dong Nguyen Khang

Last year, when the Vietnamese team won the 2024 AFF Cup, the Indonesian and Malaysian teams did not have many outstanding naturalized players. Meanwhile, Thailand only had right-back Nicholas Mickelson as a notable naturalized player, unable to stop Quang Hai, Tien Linh, Bui Tien Dung, Thanh Chung, Hai Long... from winning the championship.

In this year’s U.23 Southeast Asian tournament, U.23 Indonesia only has 1 naturalized player, Dutch-born striker Jens Raven, U.23 Malaysia only has 1 naturalized player, Scottish-born striker Fergus Tierney. Meanwhile, U.23 Thailand does not have any naturalized players. These teams cannot stop U.23 Vietnam with Trung Kien, Ly Duc, Hieu Minh, Van Truong, Van Khang, Dinh Bac… from becoming the Southeast Asian youth football champion.

This shows that the training of Vietnamese football players at the present time is among the best in Southeast Asia. Neighboring football teams can only defeat the national team and the U.23 Vietnam team if they massively use naturalized players. In the case that neighboring football teams use internal players trained by themselves, most teams in Southeast Asia are not opponents of the national team and the U.23 Vietnam team.

Achievements reflect the quality of training

The coach of the U.23 Philippines team, Garrath McPherson, one of the defeated players of U.23 Vietnam in this year's tournament, commented: "U.23 Vietnam is stronger than I imagined. U.23 Vietnam players have very good ball control ability. U.23 Indonesia players also tried to do the same as the Vietnamese players, but the Indonesian players' ball control ability is not as good as the Vietnamese players."

Photo: Dong Nguyen Khang

This comment partly reflects the quality of Vietnamese players compared to players from other football backgrounds in Southeast Asia. It is also an affirmation of the training quality of Vietnamese football in recent years. The efforts of domestic youth training centers, combined with the right strategic planning steps of football managers at VFF, have created generations of good players, helping Vietnamese teams reign at the top of the most important tournaments in the region.

Vietnam U.23 winning the U.23 Southeast Asian Championship three times in a row, and the Vietnamese team winning the AFF Cup 2024 is not a coincidence. It reflects the quality of training and human resource development of football compared to the regional average. Vietnamese football is only inferior to the naturalized players who have appeared massively in Indonesia and Malaysia in recent years. However, naturalizing players and replacing almost all the personnel in the Indonesian and Malaysian teams is not necessarily a sustainable direction!