Coach Tan Cheng Hoe has encouraged his Malaysia players to take motivation from the country’s 2014 against-the-odds win over Vietnam as the Harimau Malaya seek to overturn a 2-0 first-leg deficit in their ASEAN Hyundai Cup™ 2026 semi-final in Hanoi on Wednesday.
Former boss Dollah Salleh led the Malaysians to Mỹ Đình National Stadium for the second leg of their semi-final 12 years ago trailing 2-1 from the opening match at Shah Alam Stadium and secured a 4-2 second leg victory that sealed a 5-4 aggregate success.
The same venue will play host to the two nations once again with Tan hoping to oversee a similar turnaround to secure a berth in the 2026 decider against either Thailand or Singapore.
“Definitely, that result really gave us confidence,” said Tan, whose team lost a keenly contested first leg to a Nguyễn Xuân Son header and Faris Danish’s late own goal. “At the same time, after 12 years, the players and the coaches keep on changing.
“Of course, we want to have this kind of motivation. We know that playing against Vietnam, they have given me a tough time, a hard time, but I'm still proud of my players.”
The win in 2014 was the last time Malaysia defeated Vietnam, but Tan’s side dominated for prolonged periods in the first leg in Kuala Lumpur and the misfortune of Faris’ own goal four minutes from time altered the complexion of the second leg.
Tan, however, retains his belief in his squad and their ability to secure a result that would take the country into the final for the first time since 2018, when he was the head coach then.
“We really gave a challenge that Vietnam had to defend rather than attack,” he said of the first leg performance. “This really gave me the positivity that if our players really focus, for every moment we attack, we probably can score the goal.
“At the same time, we respect Vietnam has a good set of players. In football, everything is possible if you really have the confidence. If you have the belief, then most importantly, the players have to go together and fight together and win together.
“There's no secret in football that the better team wins. Sometimes it happens that if you are in the right moment, right timing, you can beat any team.”
Vietnam coach Kim Sang-sik stands on the cusp of leading his team into a second consecutive final having won the title in the 2024 edition and the South Korean coach is determined to oversee an improved performance from his team.
“I know that we have the advantage from the first leg with the 2-0 result but for the match tomorrow we still have to be focused and, through our training and analysis we also want to improve our performance,” he said.
“In the first leg in Malaysia, we faced difficulties from (wingers Mohamadou Sumareh and Gunalan Pavithran) and we faced a lot of attacks from the two sides.
“We’ve tried to improve this through our training and our meetings and for the match tomorrow, we have more plans to attack and to be focused on the match.”
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