Vietnamese midfielder Nguyen Quang Hai and striker Nguyen Tien Linh have been named the country’s best players at the Asian U23 Championship in Thailand.

Vietnamese midfielder Nguyen Quang Hai (Photo: VNA)

Viet Nam came to the tournament as one of the favourites finishing runners-up in the previous competition.

But the Southeast Asian region representative disappointed at the event and failed to qualify from the group stages.

Linh scored the only goal for Viet Nam at the tournament in the 1-2 loss to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea while Hai was the playmaker of the team.

The Asian Football Confederation noted that Viet Nam, under the guidance of Korean coach Park Hang-seo, played with the 1-3-4-3 formation in attack but it could quickly change to 1-5-4-1 when defending.

The tournament marked a milestone with the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system successfully making its full debut across all 32 matches.

In the final, the Republic of Korea (RoK) defeated Saudi Arabia 1-0 to lift the silverware.

The RoK, Saudi Arabia and third-placed Australia joined Japan as Asia's representatives in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Source: VNA