Vietnam women's futsal team: Looking for early ticket to quarterfinals

Vietnam women's futsal team - Photo 1.

Vietnam's women's futsal team (left) will have to improve many things after the victory over Hong Kong - Photo: AFC

The Philippines proved to be no easy opponent when they lost 0-1 to defending champions Iran in their opening match. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese women's futsal team also needs to improve a lot after a hard-fought 5-3 win over Hong Kong.

Beware of the Philippines

The Vietnamese women's futsal team defeated the host Philippines 6-1 in the group stage of the 2024 Southeast Asian Women's Futsal Championship.

On the other hand, the gap between the two teams is huge as Vietnam is ranked 11th in the world , while the Philippines is ranked 55th. However, coach Nguyen Dinh Hoang's team cannot underestimate the Philippine women's futsal team.

Preparing for the 2025 Futsal World Cup later this year as host, the Philippines has been actively training and playing many friendly matches before entering the 2025 Asian Women's Futsal Championship. As a result, in the opening match, the Philippine women's futsal team caused many difficulties for defending champions Iran (ranked 9th in the world).

And they only conceded a single goal with 3 minutes left in the match. It is worth mentioning that the Philippines did not have their main striker Katrina Guillou in this tournament because she was busy playing in the US.

Despite the unfortunate defeat, coach Rafael Rodriguez believes that his players have learned and improved a lot to prepare for the next match against the Vietnamese women's futsal team. "Vietnam is a very good team, they move the ball very quickly.

But I think we are ready and need to show the same fighting spirit as when we faced Iran. Maintaining this spirit is important for us to be able to compete with stronger opponents," the Spanish coach shared.

The Philippines' advantage is that they do not have to worry about the result when facing the Vietnamese futsal team. Because even if they lose all 3 matches in the group stage and are eliminated, the Philippine women's futsal team will still win a ticket to the 2025 Futsal World Cup as the host. With this mental comfort, the Philippines can completely make things difficult for the Vietnamese women's futsal team.

Improve weaknesses

Leading Hong Kong 3-1 in the first half, but just 3 minutes into the second half, a loss of concentration caused the Vietnamese girls to be scored twice by their opponents, who were 18 places below them in the FIFA rankings, to equalize the score at 3-3. Only thanks to two free kicks near the end of the match, the Vietnamese women's futsal team was able to score to win 5-3 in a hard-fought way against Hong Kong.

Therefore, improving the concentration of his players in the first minutes of the match is what coach Nguyen Dinh Hoang must do. And this is not only for the match against the Philippines but also for the more difficult matches that follow.

That is because to win a ticket to the 2025 Women's Futsal World Cup, the Vietnamese women's futsal team must be in the top three of the tournament. To successfully complete this difficult task, improving playing ability and not making mistakes must be put first.

"We were not really ready and did not play consistently when the opponent pushed the pace up quickly. This needs to be improved quickly," said Mr. Hoang.

Yesterday (May 8), the Vietnamese women's futsal team gathered to review the video of the opening match against Hong Kong to learn from the experience. The team also practiced seriously on the field to prepare for the match against the Philippines. Especially the coordinated attack drills when the opponent actively defended.

With what they showed against Iran, the Philippine women's futsal team showed that they are not easy to defeat.