V-League On-Field Violence and the Missed Card: When League Discipline Is Tested from the Tunnel

On September 20, 2026, I sat in the press row at Dong Nai Stadium, behind the home team's tunnel. Before kickoff, striker Nguyen Dinh Bac of Cong An Ha Noi (CAHN) walked out for his individual warm-up, bent down and retied his laces twice. In my notebook, that detail went down alongside a question mark — not to predict form, but because eleven years following Southeast Asian clubs had taught me that a player who ties his laces twice is a player who is not at peace. In the 67th minute, defender Le Van Son of Dong Nai threw his right elbow backward. Dinh Bac went down. I did not look at the big screen. I looked at the Dong Nai bench, where an assistant coach jumped up and then immediately sat back down, as if reminding himself not to overreact. The atmosphere around the technical area thickened for a moment. That was the first moment I knew this match would not end with a scoreline. In the same match, centre-back Huynh Tan Sinh of Dong Nai repeatedly kicked from behind, aiming at Dinh Bac's leg — twice, not once. Referee Le Vu Linh showed a yellow card. One yellow card for a leaving-the-ball-and-hitting-the-man foul committed twice in the same passage of play. I sat there, earpiece still carrying the broadcast commentary, and asked myself: if a training session without spectators can decide a goal at the World Cup, what can a missed yellow card decide for an entire season? The dressing room never lies — only the listener lacks patience. The two incidents at Dong Nai did not stand alone. Not long before, in round 2 of V-League 2026-2027, centre-back Doan Van Hau of CAHN broke the leg of midfielder Doan Ngoc Tan of The Cong Viettel. In the same round, foreign player Ezeqiuel Santos Da Silva of Nam Dinh stomped on the stomach of Vo Huu Viet Hoang of SHB Da Nang. Four incidents, two rounds, one season barely underway. After this run of events, facing the risk of on-field violence resurfacing and damaging the image of V-League, representatives of the organising committee, VPF and VFF met directly with the VFF Referees Committee. In that meeting, representatives of VFF, VPF and the V-League organising committee demanded that referees apply the law correctly, maintain the league's discipline, and prevent violent behaviour on the pitch. The phrase apply the law correctly, in this context, can be understood simply as not allowing missed fouls and missed cards to occur. And this is exactly the error referee Le Vu Linh made in the Dong Nai versus CAHN match on September 20. In the passage where centre-back Huynh Tan Sinh left the ball to hit the man against Dinh Bac, Le Vu Linh used only a yellow card to punish Tan Sinh. He did not use a red card in that situation, even though Tan Sinh cold-kicked Dinh Bac twice. Speaking to a Dan Tri reporter after the match, former VFF Vice President for technical affairs and former head of the VFF Referees Committee, Duong Vu Lam, commented: Referee Le Vu Linh missed a card relating to this incident. Huynh Tan Sinh left the ball to hit the man far too blatantly, yet did not receive a red card. Duong Vu Lam added: If we retroactively punish and suspend Tan Sinh for this foul, then referee Le Vu Linh must likewise be suspended from officiating. In addition, the responsibility of the VAR team must be clarified. If the VAR team — consisting of Mr Vo Hoai Thuong and Mr Nguyen Thanh Son — advised the main referee but was overruled by the main referee, then the VAR team has fulfilled its duty. Conversely, if the VAR team did not advise main referee Le Vu Linh that a red card should be used for the foul just described, then the VAR officials must also be disciplined. This is a familiar story for Southeast Asian football in general and V-League in particular: whenever on-field violence appears, people argue about one player, one referee, one moment. But someone who has sat long enough in the tunnel knows that the problem does not lie with any individual. The problem lies in a decision-making system fragmented across four entities — the main referee on the pitch, the VAR team in the closed room, the VFF Referees Committee, and the league organising committee. On-field violence does not begin with the kick. It begins with the signal that the first kick will not be properly punished. I have witnessed this no fewer than ten times over more than a decade following Malaysian and Vietnamese clubs. Players are among the best readers of signals. They do not read them from meeting minutes. They read them from how a referee places his hand over his pocket in the tenth minute, from whether the VAR team calls the main referee to the monitor, from whether a dangerous incident is brought up again at half-time. In the Dong Nai versus CAHN match, the signals sent were very clear. When Le Van Son elbowed Dinh Bac and was not sent off, the first message was sent. When Huynh Tan Sinh kicked from behind twice and received only a yellow card, the second message was sent. By the 67th minute, both teams had understood the new rules of this particular match: the price of a destructive challenge sat far below the threshold the laws of the game prescribed. I look at the feet, but I listen to that boy's heart. And the heart of a player kicked from behind twice in the same match will remember far longer than any disciplinary sentence. He will not forget. And in the next match, when the chance comes, he — or his teammate — will remember that the rules here can bend. The question about the VAR team is the deepest question in this story. Duong Vu Lam framed it very clearly: if VAR advised and the main referee overruled, VAR fulfilled its duty. If VAR did not advise, VAR must bear responsibility. This framing matters because it shows that the organising committee cannot simply punish the main referee. The decision-making chain must be treated as a chain. In many European leagues, after each round, the referees committee publishes the audio exchanges between VAR and the main referee in contentious situations. This publication is not only for transparency but also for training. When players, coaches and supporters hear why a red card was not shown, trust in the system rises, even when they disagree with the decision. In V-League, such publication is not yet common. Typically, specific disciplinary measures against referees are not announced publicly. Duong Vu Lam revealed: but just watch the referee lists in the following rounds to know whether the referees concerned have been suspended from officiating. If they are not assigned in the rounds adjacent to the one just played, most likely they are being disciplined. This discreet handling has its own history. It comes from a desire to protect referees from public pressure, to preserve the credibility of those who continue to work. But it also creates an information void that players and coaches must fill with guesswork. In that void, signals are not transmitted clearly, and each person interprets them in the way that benefits themselves. A season is a symphony — the timekeeper knows when to strike and when to stay silent. In this case, the silence of the refereeing system was the loudest sound of all. There is one thing I want to make clear, as someone who has followed football in this region for more than two decades. On-field violence in V-League is not a new phenomenon. It is a cycle with a worrying frequency. Every few seasons, a run of brutal incidents appears, public opinion erupts, the organisers meet, referees are reminded, a few disciplinary measures are issued, and then everything quiets down. Until the next cycle begins. What makes this cycle different from previous ones lies in the timing: it opened after only two rounds. In previous seasons, violent incidents usually appeared once pressure accumulated halfway through the season — when the standings had split the teams, when relegation battles began, when player contracts were nearing expiry. But the 2026-2027 season opened with violence. This is data that must be read correctly: it shows that the pressure is not coming from the standings, but from something deeper. I believe that something deeper is related to the transfer market. Last summer, many V-League clubs made major personnel changes. New players arrived unfamiliar with their teammates, unfamiliar with the tactical system and — most importantly — unfamiliar with the discipline and tempo of the league. In that context, pre-season training sessions became deficient in building team culture. Players did not learn the unspoken rules of their team and of the league. The moment I realised this was when I looked back at the training schedules of a few clubs I had access to. Some teams had shorter summer schedules than in previous years. Some teams integrated new players into the main squad across only two friendly matches. Those are conditions that do not allow the necessary mutual understanding to be built. Without mutual understanding, defenders defend by survival instinct, not by system. And survival instinct in football sometimes means kicking from behind. This is the point where I want to differ from most of the commentary currently in circulation. Many blame the players. Some blame the referees. Some blame VAR. I think all three are under pressure from a larger cause: the absence of a disciplinary culture built continuously from the training ground to the meeting room, from club level to league level. The transfer market is only a mirror — look into it and you see a team's fears. When a club buys a centre-back with a high card record, that may be the fear of relegation. When a club sells a veteran captain, that may be fear about the wage bill. Every transfer decision reflects a fear. And players on the pitch feel that fear. Fear makes them irritable, tense, and sometimes they choose a violent reaction as a way of releasing emotion. But I do not stand on the side of justification. Process is used to explain, not to absolve. A goal from a training session without spectators is still a goal. A kick from behind in an official match is still violence that must be handled according to the law. Understanding causes does not exempt any player from responsibility. What I want to keep in mind is consistency of standards. In the same match, if a player kicks from behind twice and receives only a yellow card, then a player in another match will also understand that he has similar latitude. Consistency in handling is not about the level of severity, but about severity being applied equally to all subjects. A league can be strict, can be lenient, but it cannot be strict one moment and lenient the next without breaking trust. Looking back at the four incidents in the first two rounds: Doan Van Hau broke Doan Ngoc Tan's leg; Ezeqiuel Santos Da Silva stomped on Vo Huu Viet Hoang's stomach; Le Van Son elbowed Nguyen Dinh Bac; Huynh Tan Sinh kicked Nguyen Dinh Bac from behind twice. Four incidents, three different types of violence — direct injury, stomping on a dangerous area, elbowing, kicking from behind. Each type may stem from different causes. But what all four share is that they occurred in a playing space where preventive measures were not set at the right level. The response of VFF, VPF and the V-League organising committee is necessary. But I believe the meeting with the VFF Referees Committee only addresses one layer of the problem. The deeper layer lies with the clubs. Coaches must be responsible for how their teams play. Technical directors must be responsible for recruiting players with a history of on-field violence. And the organisers need mechanisms that encourage fair play, not only mechanisms that punish violent behaviour. In developed leagues, alongside disciplinary measures, there are fair-play awards given every round, every month, every season. These awards are reported as widely as beautiful goals. In doing so, the organisers shape a cultural standard and not merely a legal standard. Players sense that beautiful play is valued, not merely treated as an alternative when violence cannot be carried out. V-League has not done this systematically. And this is, in my view, the point where Vietnamese football administrators can learn fastest from neighbouring leagues. I once told a Malaysian coach that Southeast Asian football shares one characteristic: when not confident enough in technique, players tend to turn the match into a physical battle. He laughed and said: you do not need to tell me that. This is not a condemnation. It is a structural truth about the region's football environment. Understanding it, we know where we need to invest: in technical training from youth level, in building a playing philosophy with a ball-control mindset, in being persistent with technical qualities even when results do not come. But that is a long-term story. In the short term, V-League still has a whole season ahead. The upcoming matches will prove whether the meeting between VFF, VPF, the organising committee and the VFF Referees Committee creates a new standard or is merely a stopgap measure. And the central question is whether referees are empowered to apply stricter handling, or whether they still have to weigh pressure from various parties. An important monitoring indicator is the referee list in the following rounds. Duong Vu Lam has revealed how to read it. If referee Le Vu Linh does not appear in the coming rounds, it means the referees committee has taken action. Similarly, if the two VAR team members — Vo Hoai Thuong and Nguyen Thanh Son — are absent, then responsibility has been allocated in the way Lam proposed. Those lists are semi-public signals but readable. I arrive at the dressing room before kickoff, to hear the team's breathing. And I will return to Dong Nai Stadium, as well as the other grounds of V-League, in the coming rounds. Not to search for more violent incidents, but to see whether this cycle is truly different from previous ones. Football is a sport that never lies about what is happening inside. If a new culture is forming, we will see it first in the smallest details — the way a player reaches out to help a teammate up after a collision, the way a referee raises a red card without hesitation, the way a VAR team calls the main referee back to the monitor even when the initial decision has already been made. Those details will not appear on the scoreboard. But they will be evidence that the league is genuinely maintaining discipline, and not merely declaring that it will.