Under Kim Sang-sik, Vietnamese Football Finds Its Rhythm Again — But the V.League Awaits an Answer

On the night of January 5, 2026, at Rajamangala Stadium in Bangkok, Nguyen Xuan Son scored twice and then collapsed with an injury. I sat more than four thousand kilometers away, in a small apartment in Busan, hearing the roar of the stands burst through my laptop speakers. My wife said I was crying. Perhaps I was. But what stayed with me was not the goals, but the moment Vietnam's players gathered around their fallen teammate, and in the stands, a few Thai fans stood up to applaud.

A final ended with an aggregate score of 5-3 across two legs, bringing Vietnam its first ASEAN Cup title after years of waiting. But for someone who has followed Vietnamese football for nearly five decades, the real question is not the trophy. It lies elsewhere: how far has the national team come, and where does the V.League — the cradle that sustains that team — actually stand?

I write this from Busan, where I live and work, where I report on football for Korean readers. There is a geographical distance between me and the pitches of Vietnam. But that very distance gives me a vantage point that those sitting close to the stands sometimes lack. Some lessons do not come from victory, but from the criticism heard in the stands.

In May 2026, the Vietnam Football Federation appointed Kim Sang-sik as head coach of the national team. It was the second time in seven years that Vietnamese football placed its trust in a Korean coach, after the successful spell of Park Hang-seo from 2026 to 2026. Between those two names lies a gap: Philippe Troussier's tenure ended early, leaving behind a team that had lost its way and a faith that had been chipped.

When Kim Sang-sik took the seat, the national team had just endured a string of disappointing results in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers in Asia and had lost to several regional rivals. He arrived with a resume that was not especially glittering at national-team level and was doubted from day one. That very doubt made the subsequent ASEAN Cup title an answer rather than a starting point.

To understand why a team can win the region yet still struggle on the continental stage, one must look at the supply of players. And Vietnam's player supply lies almost entirely within the V.League. This is where every story about the future of the national game begins, and also where many stories are left unfinished.

For more than a decade now, the flow of Vietnamese talent abroad has become a familiar theme. Nguyen Quang Hai moved to Pau FC in France in 2026. Doan Van Hau moved to SC Heerenveen in the Netherlands in 2026. Nguyen Cong Phuong once wore the shirts of Mito HollyHock in Japan, Incheon United in Korea and Sint-Truiden in Belgium. Each time, the domestic press called it a milestone.

But looking at the whole trajectory, most of those overseas moves ended with a return. Not many Vietnamese players stayed long enough in top-level environments to change their own level. The problem is not that Vietnamese players are not good enough, but that the system behind them is not designed to keep them at the top.

When I watch V.League matches on screen from Busan, what draws my attention is not speed or technique. It is rhythm. The rhythm of a match does not lie in the ball, but in the silence between two passes. In many V.League games, that silence is too long. The ball goes sideways, goes back, then stops to wait for an individual moment to break the balance.

The league's structure reflects this. The V.League season has long breaks to make room for the national team, forcing clubs to get used to losing key players just as form is rising. The schedule is chopped into segments, hard to sustain momentum. For a young player, that interruption is the enemy of the development process.

In Korea, where I have followed the K-League for many years, a young talent is promoted to the first team on a clear path. They have calculated minutes, fitness specialists, and a coaching staff that knows when to push and when to hold back. In Vietnam, many young players are pushed up too early because clubs lack personnel, then abandoned when form dips.

The story of Nguyen Xuan Son is an interesting slice. A naturalized striker of Brazilian origin, wearing the shirt of Thep Xanh Nam Dinh, became a pillar of the national team exactly when it most needed a genuine finisher. His arrival solved an immediate problem, but it also raised a long-term question: if the national team has to rely on a naturalized player to score in the final, where are the domestic strikers?

That is when the transfer market and the domestic scene become a mirror. In recent seasons, a few clubs such as Thep Xanh Nam Dinh, Cong An Ha Noi and Ha Noi FC have spent more heavily than the rest, creating a resource gap. That gap is not only about money, but about the ability to keep people. Strong clubs keep good players, weak clubs lose pillars, and the contest becomes predictable.

Possession percentage is the most deceptive metric in Vietnamese football today — many teams rack up 60% with meaningless sideways passes, then wonder why they cannot score. I once wrote about high pressing and was criticized, but the lesson I drew was not to stop analyzing. It was to analyze together with the people. High pressing was never wrong; I had simply looked at it with eyes that had no stands.

There is something data cannot tell, and that is exactly why I spend thirty minutes each day reading fans' comments. After the final, I read hundreds of messages. People did not talk about xG. They talked about the feeling of standing together. For a league still groping for its audience, that feeling is an asset more precious than any statistic.

Busan taught me that the fans' heart is the most honest measure, even when it breaks the writer's heart. In Korea, clubs live on the stands. In Vietnam, many teams live on sponsorship and connections. That difference determines whether a club survives for decades or just a few seasons.

Look at how the V.League handles broadcasting rights and commerce. Broadcast revenue remains low, commercial value does not match the fan base. When a club depends on a single main sponsor, that sponsor's departure can push the team into crisis. That is why many Vietnamese clubs have changed names, changed owners, or dissolved after only a few seasons.

Kim Sang-sik cannot fix the V.League's structure overnight. But he can do one thing that recent predecessors could not: create a clear playing framework, so players know what to do when wearing the national shirt. That clarity is the foundation for everything else.

In the second leg of the final, what I saw most clearly was how the team defended after going a man down. There was none of the panic of earlier matches. The players dropped into a block, kept their distances, accepted conceding the ball to protect the result. It was the sign of a team coached in organization, not one relying only on inspiration.

There is a point I want to stress, and it goes against how many people see it. The ASEAN Cup title does not prove that the V.League is healthy. It proves that a few outstanding individuals and one correct tactical framework can hide a system that is running out of breath. This is the biggest blind spot in how the domestic media celebrates success.

Fans have the right to be happy. But if we take victory as the only measure, we will overlook the fact that the team had to rely on a naturalized striker, that many pillars are at the tail end of their careers, and that the youth pipeline has not produced enough top-level replacements.

Three times I called a defender by the wrong name, and I learned to listen before writing. That lesson applies here too. Before praising a football nation, one must listen to those inside it. And what I hear from the people who work in Vietnamese football is worry, not satisfaction.

That worry is well founded. Looking at the league's structure, the number of clubs with a genuine youth academy is still small. Most teams still buy players rather than develop them. When the transfer window opens, money flows again toward established players, not toward investing in the future. It is a hard cycle to break.

Meanwhile, the generation considered Vietnam's golden generation is entering the late stage of its career. Nguyen Quang Hai, Nguyen Hoang Duc, Nguyen Tien Linh, Pham Tuan Hai — those names have been attached to the national team for years. When they leave, who will fill the gap? That is the question the V.League must answer, not with one match, but with a whole cycle.

I once went through ninety-two days away from the pitch during the pandemic, sitting in Busan and writing about every player of a Korean club I followed. Ninety-two days of a diary away from the pitch, to know I belong where I stand. That period taught me that a football nation is not measured by glorious nights, but by whether it still exists on ordinary days.

And Vietnamese football, on its ordinary days, still has much to do. Stadiums are still empty. Players still worry about making a living after retirement. Clubs still struggle to pay wages on time. Those things do not make the front pages when there is a trophy, but they determine the future.

There is one positive signal I want to acknowledge. The arrival of foreign coaches, especially Korean coaches, has brought a more professional way of working. Kim Sang-sik does not only teach tactics; he also brings a training culture, a way of managing people and of daily discipline. That is the hard-to-measure but lasting part of the value.

The distance between me and the pitches of Vietnam lets me see something those inside find hard to see: Vietnamese football is at the exact transition point between two generations. One generation has passed its peak, and a new one has not yet ripened. In that transition, the national team's results can obscure a simple reality: the foundation has not caught up with the ambition.

From the World Cup to the esports studio, I still hear one heartbeat: people make the match. Every tactical analysis, every statistic, every million-dollar contract, all of it comes back to people. And in Vietnamese football, people are both the greatest opportunity and the greatest challenge.

If there is one thing I want to say to those who run Vietnamese football, it is not to let the trophy lull them to sleep. The national team's success is the fruit of a group of talented people and a coach who knows his job. But a football nation does not live on one group of people. It lives on thousands of children playing football in academies, and on whether they have a path forward.

The ASEAN Cup title gave Vietnam a moment to be proud, and a silence in which to think. Both are necessary. But the silence matters more, because it decides whether that moment repeats itself or is only a single flash.

The one who keeps the rhythm does not need to beat the drum loudly, only to be on time, in the right place, and to love the craft enough to stand for long. Vietnamese football is the same. What it needs now is not another round of applause, but a rhythm-keeper patient enough to walk with it through its transition — and clear-eyed enough not to mistake a glorious moment for a lasting foundation.