Vietnam gets another sponsor to find new national football coach

The VFF held a signing ceremony with a sponsor from Japan on Tuesday. The contract, valid from 2024 to 2027, helps VFF have more financial resources to spend on teams and find a quality manager for the national team.

The manager position is still vacant after VFF and coach Philippe Troussier reached an agreement to terminate the contract early on March 26, after Vietnam lost 0-1 to Indonesia in the World Cup qualifiers at My Dinh Stadium in Hanoi, their third consecutive loss against the Southeast Asian rivals and first loss against them at home in 20 years.

The head coach position of the U23 Vietnam was assigned to Hoang Anh Tuan.

VFF has said its criteria for selecting the new national team manager is "culture, criticism-tolerance and acceptance of differences" to avoid repeating the mistakes they did with Troussier.

The federation hopes it can announce the new manager before the two games with the Philippines and Iraq at the 2026 World Cup qualifiers in June.

Before that, U23 Vietnam will attend the 2024 U23 Asian Cup from April 15 to May 3 in Qatar. Vietnam are in Group D with Uzbekistan, Kuwait and Malaysia. They will play the opening match against Kuwait on April 17, Malaysia on April 20 and Uzbekistan on the 23rd.