Three Goals and Three Cards: What Remains After the Third Round

At the fifteenth minute, an elbow swung up and stopped on an opponent's face. The referee did not need to ask anyone; he produced a straight red card. The match report runs to a few short lines — enough to settle the result, not enough to answer what followers of Vietnamese football have been wondering for several seasons. On the evening of September 20, in the third round of the national championship, the Hanoi Police Club beat Dong Nai by three goals to nil. Those three goals were clear and beyond argument. What sent spectators home with hot heads were three cards: one red and two yellow, all of them born from confrontations between men rather than from good football. Before the ball rolled, someone had already buried a few things under the pitch — and the worst part is that it is still breathing. The incident repeats an old scar. Only weeks earlier, in the same competition, Van Hau received a four-match suspension and a fine of twenty million dong for violent play against Doan Ngoc Tan. That verdict was announced, repeated in the press, and then quickly buried under the following rounds. Having followed domestic matches for many years, I still keep the habit of recording every disciplinary decision of the season: which player, which minute, which card, what sanction, and how long before a similar incident returns. That notebook thickens steadily every year, and that is more troubling than any scoreline. In the fifteenth minute, Dong Nai defender Van Son threw an elbow into Dinh Bac's face. The referee sent him off with a direct red card. In the same passage, Dinh Bac received a yellow for his reaction and for provoking his opponent. Two cards, two different offences, written on the same line of the report. In the second half, Dinh Bac held the ball under pressure from Tan Sinh. The Dong Nai centre-back lost his composure and repeatedly kicked the Hanoi Police forward's legs, bringing him down. Referee Le Vu Linh produced only a yellow. On the forum of the Vietnamese Football Supporters' Association, many argued the punishment was too light for the nature of the challenge, and asked the disciplinary body to review the footage, especially since a kick from behind is treated as dangerous. What the report does not say should be said plainly: the man who took that yellow is no novice. Tan Sinh was part of the national under-20 squad that went to the World Cup, won the Southeast Asian Games with the youth team, and has played professionally for more than ten years. That experience should be a shield, not an excuse. A player who has been through that many matches, faced that many forwards, still let his foot decide instead of his head. From the other side, some argue that Dinh Bac's showmanship and his habit of needling opponents have made him a target, producing injuries nobody needed. There is a reasonable part to this: a young, conspicuous player is often hunted, and a coaching staff can certainly prepare him to keep a cool head, to release the ball at the right moment, to avoid pointless confrontations. But the reasonable part stops there. No style of play, however irritating, turns a kick to the leg into permitted conduct. The law protects the player who is fouled, not the one who is provoked. Another conclusion gets repeated often: violence on the pitch comes only from players with poor technique. That conclusion is comfortable, and it does not survive the case of Tan Sinh. The issue lies in self-control and in the price attached to losing it, not in a pair of feet. And if fines are announced regularly in the press while enforcement differs from round to round, making punishments heavier settles nothing. What is missing is not bigger numbers but consistency. The stands sing of belief, while the VIP seats whisper about clauses that are never published. No line of conclusion wearies me more than one stating that a sanction has been served in full. That is exactly when the offence begins to smile. Before the fourth round kicks off, what is needed is not a promise to clean up the game. What is needed is to put the footage of the match on the table, read every challenge, check it against the rulebook, and publish the result as it is — even when that result pleases no club at all. That responsibility does not stop with the disciplinary committee. It also belongs to referees, to coaching staffs, to those who sign players' contracts and stay silent when their own man kicks a colleague's leg. The national team stands before a regional tournament. Injuries pile up week by week, and every injury is a place left empty. Will the next round add a line to that report?