Coach Kiatisak (Thai) led the Thai team from 2014 to early 2017, won the AFF Cup in 2014 and 2016, and entered the third qualifying round of the 2018 World Cup in Asia.
Coach Mano Polking (German-Brazilian) leads the Thai team from the end of 2021 to the end of 2023, winning the AFF Cup 2020 (taking place at the end of 2021) and 2022.
These two coaches of course understand the general level of Southeast Asian football, and understand the quality of the Vietnamese team compared to the level of Southeast Asia. Coach Kiatisak himself spoke up: "Leading the Vietnamese team is the dream of all coaches. Experts all want to bring the Vietnamese team to new heights, towards the continent and the World Cup arena."
Coach Kiatisak leaves open the possibility of leading the Vietnam national team
Coach Kiatisak's statement is quite similar to Coach Mano Polking's statement to the Vietnamese media just a few days ago: "Every coach in Southeast Asia wants to lead the Vietnamese team, and so do I. You have a very high-quality squad. If the VFF asks me, together we will fight to bring the Vietnamese team to new heights."
Coach Polking also expressed his desire to lead the Vietnamese team.
The Vietnamese team has just failed under coach Philippe Troussier, losing to the Indonesian team in all 3 recent matches, including 1 loss in the group stage of the 2023 Asian Cup and 2 losses in the second qualifying round of the 2026 World Cup in Asia.
However, domestic experts believe that the reason why Coach Troussier failed was because he did not use the best resources of Vietnamese football, did not use many bright stars of domestic football who were at the best age of their careers. Coaches Mano Polking and Kiatisak probably share this opinion with many experts, the two former coaches of the Thai national team believe that if the Vietnamese national team were in their hands, things would be different, the results would be different.
Next, the position of Vietnam national team coach is attractive to former Thai national team coaches because the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) has paid foreign coaches very high salaries in recent years.
For example, when Mano Polking was still leading the Thai team, his salary was about 700 million VND/month, less than 7/10 of the salary of coach Park Hang-seo (more than 1.1 billion VND/month, after tax), less than 1/2 of the salary of coach Troussier (about 1.5 billion VND/month, after tax).
Coach Kiatisak's salary in the past at the Thai national team and at the current HAGL and Hanoi Police teams is probably not higher than that of coach Mano Polking.
The Thai coach himself will end his contract with CAHN Club when the 2023-2024 V-League season ends, that is, around this June, which is in line with the time the Vietnamese team prepares for major tournaments at the end of 2024, including the 2026 Asian Cup qualifiers (if the Vietnamese team is eliminated from the 2nd qualifying round of the 2026 World Cup) and the AFF Cup.
Not to mention, after a period of time in charge of the Thai team, Coach Kiatisak and even Coach Mano Polking need to find new challenges with Southeast Asian football, find opportunities to overcome their previous limits, whether they can succeed in another team, other than the team of the land of the golden pagoda or not? That is the reason why "Thai Zico" and his colleague Mano Polking are very interested in the Vietnamese team.
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