Football in Vietnam

Association football in Vietnam is run by the Vietnam Football Federation. The federation administers the Vietnam national football team, as well as the V-League, Vietnamese First Division, Vietnamese Second Division and Vietnamese Third Division.

Football is unarguably the main and most popular sport in Vietnam. Its annual V-League competition has taken place since 1980 till now (except in 1988 and 1999).

When Vietnam was split into North Vietnam and South Vietnam, two national teams existed. The North Vietnamese team was not very active, playing almost exclusively other Communist countries between 1956 and 1966 whilst the South Vietnamese team took part in the first two AFC Asian Cup finals, finishing fourth both times.

 

Level	Division
I	Vietnamese Super League 14 clubs
	↓↑ 1-2 clubs
II	Vietnamese First Division 14 clubs
	↓↑ 2 clubs
III	Vietnamese Second Division 18 clubs
	↓↑ 2-3 clubs
III	Vietnamese Third Division Not limited

At the end of the 2012 season, the organizing power was transferred from the VFF to the VPF (Vietnamese Professional Football), and the V.League was initially changed to the Super League, although this name is short-lived and the league was renamed back to V.League later in the season. The first division was renamed the V.League 2. At the same time, many clubs found themselves in financial and sponsor issues, and many clubs withdrew, merge, bought another or failed to meet requirements for leagues. As a result, the number of clubs in each league changed dramatically. The 2013 V.League 1 contains 12 clubs, the 2013 V.League 2 contains 8 clubs, and the 2013 Vietnamese Second Division contains 17 clubs with Group A containing only 5 teams, while the other 2 groups contains 6 teams each as usual.