Nguyen Duc Thuy, the VND 600-1,000 Billion Target and VFF's Term 10 Financial Test

A state budget line of roughly VND 80 billion a year for football tasks has become the centre of the race for the presidency of the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) for term 10. Nguyen Duc Thuy, deputy chairman of Sacombank's board and chairman of Ninh Binh FC, says he will hand that money back to other sports and run Vietnamese football on commercial revenue from 2027. Rarely has a VFF presidential candidate put the question of whether football still needs state money on the table. The nomination list published by VFF names three candidates for the 2027-2031 presidency: incumbent Tran Quoc Tuan, term-9 communications vice-president Nguyen Xuan Vu, and Nguyen Duc Thuy. The list also covers the remaining key posts and the executive committee. Only Thuy has published an action programme detailed down to individual budget lines, and that detail turns the congress from ceremony into a confrontation over football's financial model. The programme targets VND 600-1,000 billion a year from 2027 through socialisation and revenue from sponsorship, corporate partnerships, commercial rights, digital content and football services. Thuy commits to funding 100 percent of VFF's operations and development from socialised and self-generated revenue, with no state budget. All mobilised resources must be used for their stated purpose, disclosed publicly, audited and supervised by VFF members. The VND 80 billion state allocation should, in his view, be revisited. He wants to work with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Sports Authority of Vietnam to adjust how resources are allocated, prioritising sports that need extra funding, especially those capable of competing for medals at the Asian Games and the Olympics. It is a trade: football steps off the budget priority list in exchange for control of its own revenue. For clubs, the programme is explicit: VND 2-3 billion a year for each eligible provincial federation; VND 3 billion for each V.League club, VND 2 billion for each First Division club and VND 2 billion for each women's club per season. For players and technical staff, the focus is pitches, nutrition, medical care and recovery. On competition structure, he wants VFF to work with VPF, the clubs and experts on expansion, including a 16-18 team V.League and an 18-20 team First Division. This is where the objectives begin to collide. At current scale, 14 V.League clubs at VND 3 billion is 42 billion; 12 First Division clubs at 2 billion is 24 billion; 8-10 women's teams at 2 billion is 16-20 billion; 63 provincial federations at 2-3 billion comes to 126-189 billion. The recurring obligation for this support group alone lands between VND 208 and 275 billion a year, or 21-46 percent of the lowest fundraising target. If the V.League grows to 18 clubs and the First Division to 20, that fixed commitment rises by roughly another VND 30 billion a season. Expansion, in other words, is not only about giving young players more matches. It is a financial decision: every extra club place is a recurring line in VFF's budget, while commercial and broadcast income does not rise automatically. An 18-team league has 34 rounds instead of 26, but sponsorship contracts are usually signed by season, not by match. The gap between rising costs and rising income is exactly what the 600-1,000 billion target has to carry. And here a familiar blind spot appears: fixture density. An 18-team V.League, a 20-team First Division, plus the national cup, youth competitions and national team windows, means significantly more matches per player per year. Based on my experience covering matches in the region, most muscle and tendon injuries in Southeast Asian leagues do not come from a single collision but from sequences of games with less than 72 hours of recovery. Investing in medical care and recovery is the right direction, but it only works if the calendar does not destroy the investment. On referees, the programme targets deep investment in 10-20 promising referees and assistant referees to increase appointments to major Asian matches. It is a small sum with a large effect: a Vietnamese referee working an AFC fixture brings back not only experience but a voice in technical meetings where standards on foul detection and draws are shaped. If I had to pick the most consequential line in the whole programme, it would not be the 600-1,000 billion. It would be the least discussed one: at least 5-10 Vietnamese officials recruited, appointed or regularly assigned at AFF, AFC and FIFA by 2030, plus preparation for leadership posts when elections come. Money buys programmes; committee seats buy the rules. Tournament slots, scheduling, pitch standards, hosting rights, even referee appointments for a play-off are decided in rooms where Vietnamese football is currently almost absent. A second counterintuitive point sits in the club support packages themselves. VND 2-3 billion a season is enough to pay a few key players, but also enough for a club to postpone building its own revenue. When a club's budget depends on the federation's fundraising, competition on the pitch starts to reflect relationships with the federation more than the quality of youth development. The conditions attached are what matter: support should be tied to club licensing, stadium standards, academies and audited accounts. Giving up the VND 80 billion state allocation sounds like liberation, but it also cuts an accountability chain. State money comes with tendering, state audit and public scrutiny. Sponsor money comes with sponsor expectations and clauses rarely made public. Thuy does promise disclosure, audit and member supervision, and that is the first thing to test, not the revenue target. An independently audited financial statement published before the congress would say more than any pledge. For women's football, the plan points to a system of 8-10 stable teams, with V.League clubs encouraged to found, partner with or sponsor women's sides. That is structurally sound: Vietnamese women's football has long lived on local budgets and a handful of companies rather than a club ecosystem. Connecting academies, schools, clubs and provinces into a continuous pathway covering competition, schooling and health care is the part most easily cut when budgets tighten, and the part that decides how long a women's player can keep playing. Internationally, the candidate wants closer ties with leading clubs worldwide, friendly matches and training programmes in Vietnam, and a study of hosting continental and world events where standards allow. These are attractive lines in a document but depend entirely on infrastructure: compliant stadiums, hotels, medical services, broadcast and a calendar without conflicts. Data does not lie, but it knows how to hide in the standard deviation. Here the deviation sits between the fundraising target and the fixed spending commitments the programme itself creates. The variable to watch in term 10 is not the vote count but VFF's first audited financial statement in 2028, and whether club support is tied to licensing standards. A term never ends at a congress; it just changes shirts.