Vietnam women’s football team set to defend gold at SEA Games

The Vietnamese women’s football team will leave for the RoK on April 6 for an intensive training camp ahead of the SEA Games. (Photo: VFF)

Hanoi - The Vietnamese women’s football team will leave for the Republic of Korea on April 6 for intensive training to defend their gold medal at the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games 31 to be held in Vietnam in May.

Coaches will use the camp to work on a number of likely formations and styles ahead of the tournament.

“We are building a 4-2-3-1 formation for the players," said coach Mai Duc Chung.

"We may use this line-up at the SEA Games. In my opinion, the Southeast Asian opponents are quite similar so we play attack as usual. During the training trip to the RoK, the training board will continue to adjust reasonably.”

Chung said he reminded his players to forget the achievement of winning a place at the 2023 World Cup finals and focus on the goal of defending their gold medal at the 31st Games.

In the RoK, the Vietnamese team will have two friendly matches with the RoK women’s team on April 9 and April 11. Then they will have four more friendly matches against strong female teams.

On April 21, the Vietnamese team will return home and move to Quang Ninh province to complete the final preparations for the region's biggest sporting event.

During this gathering for the Games, coach Chung called up 31 players, including many young faces to familiarise themselves with events from the SEA Games to the 2023 World Cup finals in Australia and New Zealand.

“We called many young players to continue training," the coach added.

"Recently, the team brought in some young faces such as Nguyen Thanh Nha and Luong Thi Thu Thuong. Some other young players have also made remarkable progress. We always focus on training young players to ensure enough for competitions.”

The Vietnamese squad will have a busy year when they will compete in the SEA Games in May, the AFF Cup in the Philippines in July, and the qualifying round of the AFC Women’s Asian Cup in China in September.

Chung added: “Those events are heavy tasks for us, especially the 31st SEA Games. Compared to the men's football, the women's team gathered a bit late for many reasons, including limited training ground.

"However, I think female players are also familiar with the training method and always try to improve their fitness quickly to prepare for tournaments well."

Captain Cu Huynh Nhu said: "The women's football event of the SEA Games will take place at Cam Pha Stadium in Quang Ninh province and because of the expectations of the fans, the team is also under pressure.

"But I and my teammates will use that pressure as motivation to work hard and achieve good results. We only have a very short time to prepare. We have a new journey ahead of us and we hope to have a lot of luck. The team currently has many young faces, but they participated in the national team in the past. I believe the players have accumulated a lot of experience and integrated well with the whole team."