The Vietnamese women’s football team train in South Korea to prepare for the Tokyo Olympics third qualifying round. (Photo: vff.org.vn) Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - The Vietnamese women’s football team are ready toface Myanmar at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020’s third qualifying round in theRepublic of Korea on February 6.
The match will take place at Jeju World Cup Stadium.
Vietnam only need to win this match to secure a ticket to the nextround as one of two best teams of Group A.
Vietnam are in Group A with the Republic of Korea, Myanmar and the Democratic People’sRepublic of Korea (DPRK). However, the DPRK withdrew from the event for anundisclosed reason, making qualifying for the next round that much easier.
“We will try our best to beat Myanmar and then the match with Republic of Koreanwill only be a formality as we will have won the right to enter the play-offtournament,” said coach Mai Duc Chung.
Chung said his team are very eager and confident to play their opening match ofthe event following their outstanding performance at the AFF Cup 2019 and SEAGames 30 in which they won both events.
Vietnam are considered better than Myanmar, as they defeated them 4-0 to topGroup B in the AFF Cup 2019, before winning the tournament.
In Group A’s opening match, hosts Republic of Korea crushed Myanmar 7-0 onFebruary 3.
Myanmar have all the key players that competed in the SEA Games 30 in thePhilippines last December in which they won the bronze medal, while theVietnamese side is mostly made up of the squad from the same tournament,except midfielder Chuong Thi Kieu who hasn’t recovered from her injury in theregional event.
Though they lost heavily to the Republic of Korea, Myanmar are confident aheadof the match with Vietnam.
Striker Yee Yee Oo said she believed in Myanmar’s abilities and while takingthree points against Vietnam wouldn't be easy, Myanmar would make everyeffort to reach their target.
Yee said the match with the Republic of Korea was a very difficult challengefor her team. Myanmar didn’t play well in the cold weather and the Republic of Koreawere too strong. Her team got a lesson from the loss with the Republic of Koreaand they would try to improve in the upcoming match.
In the Olympic qualifiers, the eight strongest teams in Asia are divided intotwo groups.
The teams will play in a round-robin format from February 3-9 to decide the toptwo teams from each group for the play-off tournament.
In the play-off tournament, each team will have a home game and an away leg.The winners of each play-off match will be the Asian representatives atthe Olympics, together with hosts Japan./.
VNA
