The Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) is struggling to finance a contract extension for national team head coach Park Hang-seo, if reports are to believed.
The South Korean tactician who has led Vietnamese football to unprecedented success at the U-23 and senior levels will have his contract run out in January 2020 and has expressed his desire to extend his stay in Southeast Asia.
However, the VFF are left wondering how they will afford the hike in pay for the former Korea Republic international and his support stuff once a new contract is drawn up.
Park joined Vietnam national team in 2017 at a basic salary of US$ 20,000 per month, according to Tuoi Tre News. The coach’s salary as well as other monthly expenditure amounting to a monthly US$ 34,400 has been footed by Vietnamese entrepreneur Doan Nguyen Duc, chairman of the Hoang Anh Gia Lai Group which runs HAGL FC.
Duc is said to have given the VFF a total of US$ 817,000 over the past two years to pay the wages of Park which will stop when the coach’s contract runs out on January 31, 2020.
According to Tuoi Tre, Park is expected to earn around US$ 30-40,000 if he is to extend his deal with Vietnam and it will be VFF who will be solely responsible to pay his wage and other expenditures.
Apart from this, they will also have to find ways to pay the support staff Park will have for the senior and U-23 teams and many believe that it will be a tough challenge for the federation who has been running on losses for a while — US$ 258,000 in the 2017 fiscal.
It is expected that the VFF might turn to the Vietnam government and the General Department of Sports and Physical Training to share at least some of the financial burden.