Football chairmen demand V-League overhaul

Football team bosses continue to call for an overhaul of Vietnamese football

The gathering drew the participation of Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) Vice Chairman in charge of finance, Le Hung Dung. Dung is also chairman of Eximbank’s Board of Directors.

During the meeting, participants frankly pointed out the shortcomings of Vietnam’s football over recent years, including VFF’s poor management, uncontrollable increase in footballer salaries and club bonuses.

Bonus payments to players have become a norm, and clubs have had to offer their players huge bonuses prior to matches to even get a standard level of performance from their team. This form of player blackmail has become common place.

Most of the chairmen called for immediate changes to the V-League’s organisation board and a reshuffle of the referee council.

Doan Nguyen Duc, Chairman of Hoang Anh-Gia Lai Football Club, said, “the V-League’s organisers and referees should be mainly blamed for the deterioration of V-League’s quality. From my point of view, we desperately need a reshuffle of the V-League. It’s unacceptable that referees who make major errors are just suspended for two matches.”

According to Vo Quoc Thang, Chairman of Long An Football Club, a friend of his who is chairman of a football club in Thailand spends between USD1-1.2 million per season on his team. Yet three to four times that sum can easily be spent in Vietnam on running a football club, but in far more inferior way, he claimed.

“We advocate a healthy football environment, but the cleaner we are in our organisation and approach, the more we suffer. Referees have been held in high esteem and immune from criticism for years despite their poor quality, resulting in current situation,” Thang noted.

VFF Vice Chairman Le Hung Dung said, “Many footballers are paid much higher than they deserve. This is the fault of the football clubs themselves. Chairmen should look at themselves if they want to find who is responsible for being too generous with their bonuses.”

Duc called for VFF and V-League organisers to strictly punish overly high wages that are distorting match performances or misconduct. He said responsibility couldn’t just be left to the football clubs.

Chairman of relegation-reprieved Hanoi ACB Nguyen Duc Kien proposed that VFF should map out the level of bonuses that clubs would be allowed to offer players.

At the end of the meeting, all the participants agreed to call for change to the entire V-League’s organisation board and referee committee as soon as possible.