Nam Dinh FC Changes Head Coach: Calling Back an Old Acquaintance

Apart from reaching the quarter-finals of the National Cup (their opponent is SHB Da Nang), Nam Dinh has virtually no other concrete goals. Seeing the poor performance of the defending V-League champions, the management of the Nam Thanh club was compelled to summon back Coach Vu Hong Viet to the head coach position, following a three-month interim parting.

This decision was made just days before hosting their "brother" club Ninh Binh at Thien Truong in round 14 of the V-League 2025/2026. Understanding the nature of the game, Coach Hong Viet surely must know what the message here is!

Vu Hong Viet is among the ranks of talented young coaches. People say that at Thien Truong, the path to achieving back-to-back V-League championships two years in a row, as if paved with gold, was somewhat unfair to the close-knit duo Vu Hong Viet - Nguyen Trung Kien. That was truly a feat previously accomplished only by giants like HAGL, GDT Long An, B.Binh Duong, and Hanoi FC. Coaches Hong Viet and Trung Kien are certainly no novices!

However, in Nam Dinh, you not only need talent, but also must know how to listen and be prepared physically for meetings with leadership from midnight until dawn. According to former coach Nguyen Van Sy's description, the true owner of the Nam Thanh club is never short of "yes-men" advisors by his side. Gaining the trust of this powerful club owner is the prerequisite factor, only then does the coaching ability of the managers come into play.

When the pair Hong Viet and Trung Kien were still guiding the team quite well, a change was made, and perhaps that decision came from the aforementioned "yes-men" advisors.

In another development a few years ago in Thu Dau Mot, Coach Le Huynh Duc also unexpectedly bid farewell to Becamex Binh Duong, even though the former star player and national team captain was still in the midst of his envisioned revolution. "If I don't feel trusted, if I don't feel comfortable, then I'll just step away," Duc once shared with Sports and Culture. Of course, things are never that simple. Around the coaching cabin of the Thu land team, there also seemed to be no shortage of "yes-men" advisors.

After parting ways with B.Binh Duong, Coach Le Huynh Duc focused on teaching AFC coaching license courses, until one day he was called back to lead Ho Chi Minh City Police FC. This weekend, Duc will face his former club Becamex HCMC at Thong Nhat Stadium.

History shows that after any change, it is very difficult to regain stability. Hanoi FC (under its predecessor name Hanoi T&T) lost its dominance after parting with Coach Chu Dinh Nghiem in 2021. The same goes for Ha Tinh FC with Nguyen Thanh Cong, or like HAGL, Becamex Binh Duong, and SHB Da Nang, where instability has lasted for decades. Personnel stability for an ambitious football club is a crucial factor, and it begins with stability in the coaching cabin.

In the Vietnamese-style professional football environment, the game is essentially owned by the club owners. The owner dictates tactics, selects the lineup, and even decides on substitutions. Coaches or star players, to put it bluntly, are merely decorative pieces. Therefore, it is very difficult for professionals to maintain a coaching philosophy and team development strategy unless they are truly strong-willed. The era of the late Coach Le Thuy Hai, Henrique Calisto, or Le Huynh Duc himself (at SHB Da Nang) is long gone.

After over 20 years of AFC普及 coaching diplomas and certificates, through programs like Vision Asia..., Vietnam's pool of coaches is now very abundant. Yet only a few are trusted and actively practicing, while others remain in seclusion waiting for their chance or are even unemployed. Among the generation of coaches born in the 1980s, currently only Nguyen Cong Manh (Ha Tinh) and Le Duc Tuan (SHB Da Nang) are leading V-League clubs; the rest mainly work in the First Division or as assistant coaches. This is also considered somewhat late for the times.

The future of football certainly belongs to the young, including young coaches. They are the ones who grasp modern coaching philosophies very quickly. Notable examples include Nguyen Minh Phuong (HCMC FC), Nguyen Viet Thang (Tuoi Truong Dong Nai), Vu Nhu Thanh, or Phan Thanh Binh (Dong Thap)...

But when will that future arrive?