National Cup 2026-2027: Four V-League Defeats and the Cost Equation Behind the Scorelines

In the 77th minute at Quy Nhon, the score was already 1-3. It was not until the 94th minute that Hoang Anh Gia Lai pulled one back to 2-3 from the penalty spot, and the match ended right after. The way the team from the highlands lost — slow, disjointed, with almost no fallback plan once they fell behind — says more than the league table about how much of their real resources they actually poured into the National Cup. Elsewhere in the qualifying round, Thanh Hoa lost 0-2 at home to Becamex Ho Chi Minh City, a club just relegated to the first division and now a promotion candidate. Hai Phong lost 0-1 to Thep Can Tho, a side that had just relocated from Quang Ninh to the Mekong Delta and had lost its opening match of the first-division season. Hong Linh Ha Tinh fell in a penalty shootout away at Phu Tho after a 0-0 draw over 90 minutes. Eight qualifying matches of the 2026-2027 National Cup across 19 and 20 September 2026 produced four V-League defeats to first-division clubs, three of them at home. Only Bac Ninh won, 3-2 away at Long An. To read this round properly, two things that are usually merged must be separated: squad quality and level of priority. For most V-League clubs without title ambitions, the National Cup is not part of the main investment portfolio. The deeper a run goes, the heavier the travel, accommodation and recovery costs; thin squads must split minutes across two fronts; and a survival place in V-League is a condition for existence, financially and competitively. That is a pure opportunity-cost calculation, and at many clubs the answer was written before the ball rolled. Based on my experience watching domestic cup qualifying rounds, the pattern repeats fairly consistently: V-League clubs rotate five to seven positions, drop their pressing intensity, and accept defending deep; first-division clubs keep their best core and enter the match with a markedly higher level of commitment. Tactics are what you use when the opponent believes they have already read you — and here, the first-division clubs read that their opponents would not field their strongest eleven. The 2026-2027 season makes everything heavier. Thanh Hoa only learned they still existed just before V-League kicked off, with a limited squad because there was not enough money to keep key players or sign new ones. Hoang Anh Gia Lai entered the season with a weaker squad than last year, after two straight defeats in V-League. Hai Phong and Hong Linh Ha Tinh started reasonably well, but neither treats the cup as a top priority. Start with Thanh Hoa, because this is the case that most clearly exposes the logic behind the scoreline. Before facing Becamex Ho Chi Minh City, Thanh Hoa picked up another off-field variable: FIFA ordered the club to pay more than 305,000 USD, roughly 8 billion Vietnamese dong, to striker Rimario Gordon after the player filed a claim. The document was sent on 16 September 2026. If the matter is not resolved within 45 days of that date, the Thanh Hoa club will be banned from registering new players for three transfer windows. The complication is that the liability arose during the previous sponsor's tenure, while the club has since been handed over to a new sponsor. Set that obligation next to the 0-2 home defeat and the picture is far clearer than the verdict that "the team lacked commitment". A club handling a financial obligation with a 45-day deadline will not pour resources into a cup tie while it is counting every dong to keep the team alive. Becamex Ho Chi Minh City had a squad no weaker than the hosts, played with more determination, and won without much difficulty. Three pieces of evidence point the same way: the hosts lost the midfield battle, failed to hold the distance between their lines when countered, and had no way to create something out of nothing when stuck. Hoang Anh Gia Lai is the second case, and here one detail is underrated: home advantage. Pleiku Stadium is having its pitch renovated because of poor drainage during prolonged heavy rain, so the highlands club had to play temporarily at Quy Nhon. An empty stadium is the largest laboratory modern football has ever had — it strips away the stands, strips away the psychological edge, and leaves exactly what a team truly has in its legs. At Quy Nhon, Hoang Anh Gia Lai had none of their familiar support and met a Hung Yen side far hungrier. They trailed 1-3 from the 77th minute and only managed a 2-3 consolation from the spot in the 94th. Anyone who has watched Hoang Anh Gia Lai in the first two V-League rounds sees the same problem: a thin squad, poor resistance to pressure in the final 20 minutes, and an attacking structure that essentially dissolves once they fall behind. The year 2026 taught me this: a team stands firm through its system, not through its lineup. This season Hoang Anh Gia Lai does not yet have a system solid enough to compensate for a squad lacking depth. Hai Phong is the third case, and the clearest example of commitment being decided in advance. Their opponents, Thep Can Tho, had just moved from Quang Ninh to the Mekong Delta and had lost their opening first-division match. That club needed a win to regain rhythm, and got it in the first half through a goal by Thaileon, a striker who had joined only days earlier. The Russia World Cup taught me that attacking is a form of expression while defending is the answer — Thep Can Tho chose the answer, and Hai Phong had no question sharp enough to break it. Hong Linh Ha Tinh followed a different script but reached the same ending. A 0-0 draw over 90 minutes at Phu Tho, then a 2-3 defeat in the shootout. Penalties lean more on skill and psychology than tactics, but how a team walks into the preceding 90 minutes also matters: the hosts played the match of their season, the visitors played the match of a congested calendar. Taken as a whole, one shared point stands out: all four V-League defeats came in matches where the first-division side scored first or kept a clean sheet in the opening 60 minutes. When the nominal underdog takes the lead, momentum swings far faster than the actual gap in quality. That is a direct consequence of rotation: a second-choice lineup needs time to find rhythm, and the cup grants no time. The safest reading of this qualifying round is that an early cup exit may actually suit Hoang Anh Gia Lai, who need to concentrate on the V-League survival race. That reading is correct on scheduling grounds, but it ignores a blind spot. A team cannot switch commitment on and off. A group of players coached for weeks with the message that a competition does not matter will carry that message into the next match. For thin squads like Thanh Hoa or Hoang Anh Gia Lai, the National Cup is also the only front that allows experimentation without paying for it in league points. Drop it, and they lose the laboratory too. Young players lose minutes, alternative tactical plans go unverified, and when the V-League reaches its tight phase the coach is left with a squad already drained. The blind spot is this: the cost saved in the cup does not show up in the accounts, but it returns in the form of injuries and decline during the decisive stretch. The next round of the National Cup will be a clearer test. If V-League clubs keep rotating at a similar rate and keep losing, the issue is no longer priority but squad depth — something built over multiple seasons. And if they field stronger lineups and win, we will know that the past qualifying round was a decision, not a limitation.