Vietnam 4-2 Pakistan: The Second-Half Flood and a Crack That Cannot Be Hidden

In the 50th minute, Hai Long received a pass laid into the box and put the ball in the net. The score was levelled at 2-2. In the stands of Gelora Bung Karno in Jakarta, a man in a red shirt sprang to his feet and then sat down very quickly, as though afraid his joy would dissolve if he stood too long. I watched that moment through a screen, from a room in Chengdu, in the early-October cold. An equaliser in the 50th minute is not a masterpiece. But it is an exhale. And in football, there are nights when an exhale matters more than a cheer.

Vietnam went into their final group match against Pakistan as the side holding second place in Group B, with a place in the final still hanging in the balance. This is the kind of match fans call a match of fate: win to keep hope alive, lose to shut the door yourself. Pakistan, a national team that does not belong to Southeast Asia, arrived with the posture of a side with nothing left to lose. And teams with nothing to lose are always the most dangerous, because they play with freedom while the favourites play with fear.

The first half was a lesson in the gap between controlling the ball and controlling the match. Vietnam held more possession, circulated more, pushed both full-backs high and pinned Pakistan deep. But the very way they kept the ball exposed a gap behind their defensive line. One lapse in concentration, one slow beat in dropping back, and Pakistan scored. Then, late in the half, once more, Vietnam's goal shook. The scoreboard read 1-2 when the referee blew for the end of the first 45 minutes. The team with more of the ball walked into the dressing room with heads bowed.

I have watched many matches like this in more than five decades at the keyboard. The kind of match in which the stronger side builds a trap for itself: they dominate, they grow confident, and then they are punished by the very thing modern football calls transition. This is not a Vietnam problem alone. It is the problem of every team that chooses an imposing style without having learned how to defend while attacking. The pitch never betrays anyone; people simply forget that it also knows how to embrace.

The second half was a completely different story. Kim Sang-sik, the Korean sitting on the bench, changed something in those 15 minutes at the break. Perhaps personnel. Perhaps the distance between the lines. Perhaps just a sentence. But Vietnam returned with a different rhythm. Right at the start of the second half, Hai Long equalised, and that exhale turned into a flood. In the 57th minute, Nguyen Hoang Duc — a midfielder known more for his passing than his finishing — surged forward and met a placed pass to score. It was the goal of a midfielder who understands that the match waits for no one: he arrived at the right time, in the right place, like a man who has read two beats ahead of the story.

Then Dinh Bac, the young striker, dribbled through and scored on his own. A solo goal, the kind that sits in no tactical diagram. Youth is not only speed; it is the way a person chooses to charge forward. Dinh Bac charged forward, and in that moment he was not thinking about the system, not about the pressure, not about an entire football nation watching him. He was thinking only of the goal.

And then, in stoppage time, Williams Minh Hoang — a name that hints at a naturalisation journey — sealed the 4-2. Four goals in the second half. A comeback that, if you looked only at the scoreboard, would make you think it had been an easy afternoon. But football, as I often write, does not live by the scoreboard. It lives in what happens between the numbers.

The key point that few want to mention: a 4-2 win by the team with more possession, in which that team fell behind and then conceded again late, is not a win of domination. It is a win of late eruption. And a late eruption, however beautiful, is an unsustainable winning mechanism. You cannot rely on the second half will come to get through a tournament. You cannot lose defensive focus early and then count on the attack to save you. One day, the attack will not save you.

What is more, the 50th-minute equaliser should not obscure a hard truth: Vietnam did not reach the final. They finished the group stage as runners-up of Group B. For a football nation that has won the region and always counts itself among the title contenders, having to play a third-place match is a step backwards. The 4-2 win over Pakistan soothes the mood, but it does not erase the fact that the team was absent from the last match. A championship is an embrace, but the most beautiful embrace is when the pitch holds the losers. The problem is that Vietnam did not come here to be embraced. They came here to lift the trophy.

There is one thing I always wrestle with when analysing Southeast Asian teams. We are too easily satisfied with a beautiful win. We treat four second-half goals as proof of strength, when those four goals are in fact proof of a weak first half. If Pakistan — a team from outside the region — could score twice against Vietnam merely through transitions and lapses in concentration, what will happen when the opponent is Thailand, Indonesia, or Malaysia — teams of the same tier but far sharper at punishing mistakes?

Malaysia, the runners-up of Group A, are Vietnam's next opponents in the third-place match. This is a same-tier contest, not a match Vietnam can approach with we are stronger. Malaysia understand Vietnam well enough to exploit exactly that crack. And if that crack opens again, the third-place match will no longer be a chance to salvage the tournament; it will be an indictment.

I wonder: does Kim Sang-sik see what I see? A good coach is not someone who finds a way to score four goals against a weaker opponent. A good coach is someone who finds a way for his team not to need four goals to win. Vietnam's problem does not lie in the attack — where Hoang Duc, Hai Long and Dinh Bac have shown they can make the difference. The problem lies in the defence, and in how the team shifts from a controlling state to a defending state.

In other words, this is a team that knows how to attack but has not yet learned how to protect what it has earned.

I write these lines with the image still ringing in my head of the man in the red shirt in the Jakarta stands, who sprang up and sat down very quickly in the 50th minute. He did not celebrate fully. Perhaps, over many years, he has learned that joy in Vietnamese football often comes with worry. And perhaps he is right.

At 69, I have learned that the world still runs faster than I do, but longing always stands still. I remember the Vietnam teams of the 1990s, teams with less technique than today's but who knew how to stand firm. Football has changed. Players are faster, stronger, more skilful. But the old lesson remains intact: you can only become champions when you know how not to lose. And Vietnam, with all the talent it possesses, is still learning that lesson.

Tonight, Kim Sang-sik's team will step into the third-place match against Malaysia. I will again sit before a screen, in Chengdu, and again take notes. I will not look at the scoreboard first. I will watch the first 20 minutes. For if Vietnam hold their focus for the first 20 minutes, I believe they can end this tournament with a smile. If not, the story will again begin with an exhale — and end with a flood that arrives too late.

Empty seats still ring with song, because longing, too, is a kind of supporter. But this time, I hope the Vietnamese fans do not have to sing in longing. I hope they get to sing in joy.