The Southeast Asia U23 Championship, which is being held in Cambodia, is currently over, and the teams that have advanced to the top four are Vietnam, Thailand, Laos and Timor-Leste, the last two teams are the first time to reach the final four, and the semi-final match is Vietnam vs East Timor, Laos vs Thailand.
The Southeast Asia U23 Championship is a traditional tournament hosted by the Southeast Asian Football Union, this time played by players born after January 1, 1999, with only Vietnam sending players in the 01 age group. In this tournament, there are a total of 3 groups, and the first place in each group is directly qualified, and the 2nd place with the best results can also be promoted.
As two favorites to win the championship, Vietnam and Thailand were divided into the same group, and finally the two teams joined hands, and the other two teams were Laos and East Timor, both of which won the first place in the group.
Compared with the Lao team, the East Timorese team is ranked lower in the world, only 198th, and is recognized as one of the super fish belly in the world. At this year's Southeast Asia U23 Championship, Timor-Leste is the biggest dark horse, drawing 2-2 with the Philippines in the first round, defeating Brunei 3-1 in the second round, and defeating Cambodia 1-0 in the final round, winning the first place in the group with 2 wins and 1 draw and 7 points.
This is the first time in the history of East Timor that it has reached the final four of all championships in Southeast Asia, setting a record of 17 years. With a population of only 1.32 million, the East Timor Football Association officially joined FIFA in 2005 and is one of the weakest national teams in the world, and has long been a sending boy for Asian teams.
Timor-Leste U23 has played against the Chinese U23 men's football team in recent years, and in the group stage of the 2018 Asian Games men's football team C, the Chinese team defeated the East Timorese team 6-0, of course, the Chinese national youth team also lost 0-1 to the East Timorese team.
Southeast Asian football has improved a lot in recent years, with Vietnamese football being the most obvious example, with both the national team and the youth team beating the Chinese team. Today, the Laos, Myanmar and Timor-Leste teams also have a good performance, the U23 age group represents the strength of the national team in the next five years, and the future strong opponents of the Chinese team will become these former fish belly teams in Southeast Asia.