In round 2 of the J.League Cup, striker Cong Phuong was registered on the official competition list. This is the second official match and the first main match of Phuong with the Japanese team.
According to Yokohama Club’s list, Cong Phuong will play in the midfield. Most likely, the Nghe An player will play highest in the midfield, close to striker Solomon Sakuragawa. Other players in the midfield are Touma Murata, Takuya Wada, Yota Ogura, Yoshihiro Nakano and Mizuki Arai.
Yokohama’s goalkeeper is Kengo Nagai. The three midfielders include Takumi Nakamura, Katsuya Iwatake, and Soma Sato. Yokohama Club is a guest at Fagiano Okayama’s field. Okayama is also a team belonging to J.League 2. On the rankings, they ranked third, right above Yokohama Club.
Cong Phuong wears Yokohama’s number 28 shirt.
Cong Phuong moved to Yokohama at the beginning of last season. However, he was not used by coach Yomoda Shuhei. The striker born in 1995 only played for 2 minutes in a cup match. He did not have a chance to play in J.League 1 before Yokohama was relegated this season.
This season, Cong Phuong is expected to play more, but the opportunity has not yet come to him. This player mainly plays for the reserve team to maintain his physical strength and feeling on the ball.
At the end of February 2024, coach Philippe Troussier went to Japan to evaluate Cong Phuong’s performance before calling this player back to the national team. However, he missed two matches against Indonesia in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers due to a recurring foot injury.
Nguyen Cong Phuong was trained at HAGL Club, and is one of the best players of course 1 of the mountain town football team. He has gone abroad many times to play football for Mito Hollyhock, Incheon United, and Sint Truident clubs. The 2022 season ended, Cong Phuong and many first-year players’ contracts expired and decided to part ways with HAGL Club.
In the national teams, Cong Phuong achieved many successes when he and U23 Vietnam won the runner-up position of U23 Asia 2018, reached the semi-finals of ASIAD 18 with the Vietnam Olympic team and helped the national team win the AFF Cup 2018, in quarterfinals of the 2019 Asian Cup, going to the third qualifying round of the 2022 World Cup. He is in the top 10 best strikers in the history of the Vietnamese team.
