Park Hang Seo from the Republic of Korea (RoK) has officially become the head coach of the men’s national, U23 and Olympic football teams of Vietnam.
Park’s contract with the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) lasts from October 2017 until the end of 2019.
Park Hang Seo, born in 1959, used to be a player of the RoK national team before starting a professional coaching career. He was known as the No 1 assistant of Guus Hiddink, who led the RoK team to the semi-finals of the World Cup 2002 and the RoK’s U23 team to win the bronze medal at the Asian Games in the same year.
He and his teams obtained many achievements at different tournaments of the RoK. Notably, he set a record in 2013 when he led the Sangju Sangmu FC with all players being RoK citizens to win 11 consecutive victories at the K.League Challenge.
Before the VFF inked the contract with Park, the football teams of Vietnam were temporarily led by Mai Duc Chung, head coach of the women’s national team. Chung replaced coach Nguyen Huu Thang, who resigned after the national U22 team was defeated at the 29th Southeast Asian Games (SEA Games 29) in Malaysia in August.
The first challenge to Park is to lead the national team in a match against Afghanistan at My Dinh Stadium, Hanoi, on November 14, within the fifth qualification round of the 2019 AFC Asian Cup.
The new coach expressed his hope to receive support from football fans and the media. He also wants to bring new vitality to the national, U23 and Olympic teams so that they will gain the best results at upcoming international events.
Source: VNA