V-League games last season attracted a record 1.8 million fans, an average of 10,000 fans, said the Vietnam Football Federation on September 9.

The federation also praised the coaching of Le Huynh Duc of Da Nang and Nguyen Van Sy from Ninh Binh.

Duc, at 37, is the youngest coach in Vietnamese football history. He helped his team win the V-League title after a 17-year wait, while Sy helped Ninh Binh win the First Division title and promotion to the top league.

The Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) general secretary, Tran Quoc Tuan, said football last season was the most exciting he had seen since sport turned professional nine years ago.

“Players scored a total of 548 goals in 182 matches in the V-League, with an average of three goals per game. There was on average more than 10,000 fans attending each game, an increase of 40 percent on the previous year,” Tuan said.

However, he criticised some clubs for not controlling hooliganism better.

“Organising boards in some stadiums did not control crowd violence well. Fans threw bottles and objects onto the pitch and used abusive language towards referees and opposing teams,” he said.

In V-League games last season, there were 845 yellow and 52 red cards handed out.

Despite the economic crisis, 14 V-League teams spent a total of 300 billion VND (17 million USD) this year on players.

Vietnamese footballers were being paid on average between 10 million VND (571 USD) and 20 million VND (1,100 USD) a month – a record for football./.