Women’s World Cup 2023: Vietnam in-depth team guide and prediction

This team guide is part of a collaboration with the Guardian and other leading newspapers from the nations participating at the Women’s World Cup 2023.

Written by Minh Chien Tu for Zing.

Overview

Making their Women’s World Cup debut in 2023, Vietnam are one of the least experienced teams in the tournament. The women’s national side was only formed in 1990 and the team played its first official international match in 1997. Around this time, many of the mainstays of the current side were just being born. However over the last 26 years, the team has made great strides, recently rising from 42nd to 32nd in the Fifa world rankings (and from eighth to fifth in Asia).

Over the past 10 years, Vietnamese women’s football has witnessed an advance at lightning speed with the team being crowned SEA Games champions four times in a row. Their achievements in Southeast Asia are a solid stepping stone for Vietnam to assert themselves on the international stage. Vietnam officially earned their place in the World Cup after an intense playoff series in the 2022 AFC Women’s Asian Cup, where they won against Thailand and Taiwan (Chinese Taipei).

Although there is a lot to do regarding women’s football development, Vietnam is still able to maintain a national championship with seven teams participating. We have also witnessed the first internationally exported players in Vietnamese women’s football history, such as Huynh Nhu to Portugal and Tran Thi Hong Nhung to Thailand. The team’s appearance at the World Cup is expected to be a boost to women’s football growth so that Vietnam can close the gap to the top Asian teams.

“We don’t set high ambitions but during this tournament we can learn a lot,” the coach, Mai Duc Chung, told fifa.com. “It’s a chance for us to compete with very good opponents, and we can learn from their experience, skills and techniques. We also have to be mentally strong. We will respect all the competitors, but we are not scared.”

For their first World Cup, Vietnam will play on the counterattack. The strength of this side is that they possess a pair of fast wingers (Tuyet Dung, Thanh Nha), and an agile striker who is also a good finisher (Huynh Nhu). This style of play helped the Vietnamese women’s team score against Germany during a friendly match in Frankfurt in June.

The coach

The World Cup will be Mai Duc Chung’s last tournament as the head coach of Vietnam women’s team, closing the curtain on a glorious career with both the women’s and men’s national teams. Various foreign coaches had been hired, but no one could make Vietnam’s World Cup dream come true until Chung. He is famous for being a “stuntman” (or emergency caretaker) as he has, far too many times, been temporarily placed in charge of Vietnam’s men’s and under-23 teams in times of crisis, until a new coach could be found.

Star player

Huynh Nhu, the only exported Vietnamese player in the squad, is the captain, the main striker and the entire team’s inspiration. She has scored seven goals in her first season at Länk in Portugal. The five-times Vietnam Golden Ball Winner has shown great adaptability to the European environment and is discussing a contract extension with Länk. And what a coincidence: Portugal are Huynh Nhu and her teammates’ second opponent in the World Cup group stage.

In terms of playing style, Huynh Nhu is a comprehensive striker, she shoots well with either foot, is dangerous in the air and can dribble. Huynh Nhu is also a threat from free-kicks, as she has shown during her time at Länk.

Rising star

At 21 years old, Nguyen Thi Thanh Nha already has 27 caps for Vietnam, scoring seven goals. She has won two SEA Games gold medals, competed in the Asian Cup quarter-finals and will be key in this World Cup. A tricky and versatile attacker, Thanh Nha – already a star on Vietnamese social networks – is not an expert finisher but her speed is extremely impressive. In the friendly match which Vietnam lost 2-1 in Germany, she showed quick feet before scoring against the team ranked second in the world.

Did you know?

In a time where naturalisation has become common and can be found in every corner of the world, Vietnam’s women’s side stand out as there are no naturalised or overseas players in the team. All of the squad has trained domestically and most of the players play for Vietnamese clubs. Huynh Nhu is the only one currently playing football abroad.

Standing of women’s football in Vietnam

Football is the most popular sport in Vietnam, but women’s football is not on an equal footing with the men’s game. With the exception of the national team getting a considerable amount of attention, most club-level matches attract only a few hundred to one thousand fans to a stadium. Vietnamese women’s football still has a long way to go to reach professionalisation, and better commercialisation, to get more attention.

Realistic aim at the World Cup?

Being placed in Group E with reigning world champions the USA and the 2019 runners-up the Netherlands, Vietnam are not a realistic candidate for one of the top two positions. Vietnam’s most likely target is to limit the number of goals conceded and to try and look for something in the other match against Portugal, who are a fellow World Cup first-timer.