Thailand lose to Vietnam: Time to stop making excuses

Vietnam took a major step toward defending their title with a decisive 2-0 victory over hosts Thailand in the first leg, putting one hand on the trophy.

Thai football experts and fans have produced so many reasons to rationalize the loss to Vietnam.

However, the more Thailand searches for excuses, the more vulnerable its football appears.

The familiar script of blame

“There is nothing surprising about Vietnam beating Thailand,” football expert Wisut Sinpongporn wrote on Jingjung Football after the first leg.

“Their players are stronger and more experienced.

“Vietnam’s goal is to win the title, while we want our young players to gain experience. 

"Thailand was already at a disadvantage from the beginning.”

Some Thai fans and media outlets have gone even further, arguing that the Thai squad at the 2026 ASEAN Cup are essentially a second-string team, or even a third-string side, because several key players were not released by their clubs.

From that perspective, Vietnam’s victory was supposedly inevitable and therefore nothing to celebrate, even if Vietnam were to beat Thailand convincingly again in the second leg at My Dinh Stadium in Hanoi on Wednesday and win the title.

It is true that Thailand started the first leg with seven U23 players, while Vietnam had only one U23 player, striker Dinh Bac.

Yet that is hardly an excuse for the defeat.

Ultimately, it was Thailand’s own decision, both in terms of their objectives and the squad they chose to bring to the tournament.

More importantly, even with their strongest possible squad, Thailand might not have beaten Vietnam.

The Thais seem to have a short memory.

With their strongest team in the 2024 ASEAN Cup final, the War Elephants still lost 2-1 to Vietnam in the first leg at Viet Tri Stadium in northern Phu Tho Province, before suffering another 3-2 defeat at Rajamangala Stadium in the return leg.

At the time, head coach Kim Sang Sik’s side had only one naturalized player, Nguyen Xuan Son.

The Brazilian-born striker then suffered a serious injury and was forced off in the 34th minute of the second leg.

Vietnam, with only Vietnamese players on the pitch, still won and lifted the trophy.

Learn to accept defeat

Before the first leg of the 2026 ASEAN Cup final in Bangkok, Charnwit Polcheewin, vice-president of the Football Association of Thailand, appeared to mock Vietnam’s naturalization policy.

“I have said that the Vietnam team is not truly a Vietnamese team. This is Vietnam ‘plus’ – an expanded version of Vietnam – with Brazil added,” Polcheewin said.

However, Vietnam ultimately beat Thailand 2-0 with both goals from two homegrown players, Hai Long and Quang Hai.

In football, winning and losing are normal.

If defeat comes, the proper response is to accept it, learn from it, and do better in the next tournament.

In the end, football is settled on the pitch and measured by results.

No major football nation in the world treats their regional championship as something beneath their ambitions.

If a team cannot win their own regional competition, it is difficult to see how they can realistically dream of success at a higher level.

So when Thai fans invoke the argument that Thailand have won the regional title too many times and must now turn the attention to the continental stage to justify the defeat, Thai football seems to be doing little more than comforting itself over its own shortcomings.