VietNamNet Bridge – The Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) has set the limit of the number of foreign players that clubs are allowed to use at the V-League and First Division tournaments. Football clubs, thus, are racing to recruit foreign players who proved good before V-League 2011 opens on January 22.

Leandro left Hai Phong to join Binh Duong club with transfer fee of around $200,000/season and a monthly salary of $20,000.

Nigerian striker Samson may say goodbye to Dong Thap to play for T&T Hanoi, with a transfer fee of at least $100,000/season and high salary.

Hoa Phat Hanoi will recruit African striker Timothy again, paying him a higher salary and a bonus.

Xuan Thanh Saigon, a new name, has attracted public attention after purchasing several football stars, including Huynh Kesley. Thie club has to pay $1 million for Kesley’s three-year contract and a very high salary.

Goal-keeper Phan Van Santos earns hundreds of thousands of US dollars after leaving Ninh Binh to Navibank Saigon.

Experts said that the quality of foreign players does not match their salaries. However, since there is excessive demand on the football market , the transfer fees are very high.

To achieve their ambition at V-League 2011, some clubs have given up the policy of training young players to instead, purchase foreign players.

Many new foreign players will join V-League 2011. Most of them are members of African national teams or those who played for some tournaments in Europe.

Halfback Andy, a new face at Ninh Binh club, is introduced to have played for the Nigerian national squad for five years for some clubs in Germany before he came to Vietnam.

Hoa Phat Han has a striker who was a member of the Ugandan national team. Hanoi ACB recruits striker Lucas, who played at Serie B. Hoang Anh Gia Lai has Allan Wanga from the national team of Kenya.

However, the most outstanding player is striker Obinna, who played for Olympiakos (Greece). It is said that Binh Duong paid nearly $1 million to have Obinna. With the new striker, Lee Nguyen, Leandro and Philani, Binh Duong is considered to have the best foreign players in Vietnam.

Shortage of good goalkeepers

The training programs for the young generation of goalkeepers in Vietnam has been limited, especially in the last ten years, and as a result, first choice keepers of Vietnamese national teams have failed to draw confidence among fans.

clubs from the central region as Binh Dinh, Danang and Nghe An created trademark in training famous goalkeepers Truong Van Loi, Nguyen Van Cuong, Vo Van Hanh and Tran Minh Quang in 1990s, but currently no young names are able to replace them.

High-profile errors by keepers Duong Hong Son and Bui Tan Truong at the 2010 Suzuki Cup in December 2010 which threatened the national squad with an early exit already alarmed Vietnam.

In the past 10 years, Vietnam together with the Asian Football Confederation  held dozens of courses for coaches but none for goalkeeping coaches.

“For Olympic teams in Vietnam, positions in the attacking and midfield lines draw more attention than that for goalkeeper,” said Nguyen Van Phung, goalkeeping coach and former international keeper.

Few local keepers are taller than 1.8m, meanwhile the height, which is a disadvantage of Vietnamese footballers at international competition, is one of top requirements for a qualified keeper, he added.

To tackle the scarcity, most clubs now field a first choice goalkeeper from overseas, including the arrival of foreign players as Brazilian-born Fabio Santos, Michal Syhavy from Ukraine, Filip Madzovski from Macedonia.

But it seems that they are doing more harm to Vietnamese football rather than helping the sport.

Among a total of 12 teams playing Vietnam’s top-tier V-League in last season, six of them employ foreign keepers.

The shortage of local goalkeepers is a big concern for the Vietnam Football Federation in improving the achievements for the national side at international arena.

Source: Tuoi Tre/NLD