Japanese coach Toshiya Miura and his U23 Vietnam players will compete in the finals of the 2016 AFC U23 Championship to be held in Qatar from January 12 to 30, targeting to secure a place in the quarterfinal round.

The 18-day competition featured 16 teams – hosts Qatar, ten group leaders and five best runner-up teams of the qualification tournaments – competing according to a round-robin format in four groups, with the top two teams from each group to automatically advance to the knockout stage.

Vietnam were drawn in Group D along with Australia, Jordan and the UAE. As scheduled, Vietnam will play the opening clash against Jordan on January 14 before taking on Australia and the UAE on January 17 and 20 respectively.

Australia are thought by experts to be the winners of a quarterfinal berth for Group D, and Vietnam will have to battle it out against Jordan and the UAE for the group’s remaining knockout slot.

In preparation for the AFC Finals mission, Toshiya Miura has arranged U23 Vietnam three friendly matches against Japanese opponents – JFL Selection (a semiprofessional team), Cerezo Osaka (a team playing in J-League 2), and notably U23 Japan scheduled for January 7.

Earlier, Vietnam qualified for the 2016 AFC U23 Finals as the third best runner-up of the qualification round held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia a few months ago, coming in second place in Group I with six points.

The top three teams of the Finals will qualify for the 2016 Summer Olympics men’s football tournament in Brazil as the AFC representatives.

Source Nhan Dan