'The Vietnamese team shot more than Nepal passed over the halfway line'

As mentioned, football is losing its appeal in Nepal. On the evening of October 9, very few Nepalese websites reported on the match between the Nepalese football team and the Vietnamese national team in the 2027 Asian Cup qualifiers. After the match ended with a score of 1-3 in favor of Kim Sang-sik's team, except for Ekantipur (and Hamrakura 1 hour later), most of the news was related to the Nepalese cricket team playing in the T20 World Cup, or the U16 cricket team in the Eastern Zone ACC U16 Championship.

On the Nepal Football Federation's social media page, fan Ganesh Paudyal wrote that he was watching the cricket match between Japan and Kuwait, only to accidentally find out about the football match between Nepal and Vietnam. "It seems like football is no longer of interest," Paudyal commented.

According to others, there are many reasons why football is no longer the top favorite sport in Nepal, and the team's performance at Go Dau Stadium in Ho Chi Minh City, more than 2,000 kilometers away, is one of the explanations.

Coach Matt Ross and his team lost points in front of Nepalese fans due to their negative playing style.

"The way of playing is more important than the result, but what kind of way of playing is this when the players keep passing the ball backwards, instead of moving forward," a fan named Rajiv Shrestha lamented. "The number of shots by the Vietnam team is more than the number of passes across the halfway line of the Nepal team," another named Hangkhim Roshan Rai sarcastically said.

In another comment, Jeewan Khaniya asked, "Why do Nepal players keep making unnecessary back passes, then putting pressure on the defense and making mistakes? "This team will never get better," he commented.

Shubh Acharya accused Matt Ross and his team of "playing Haramball football (anti-football, negative defense) without getting any results, or simply not even knowing how to pass the ball properly". Recalling before the match, the Nepal coach also openly played defensively with the goal of earning 1 point, because he said, "this is his forte".

After failing to secure points, Nepal are still stuck at the bottom of Group F. Even if the prospect of a 3-0 win, reversing the 2-0 defeat to Malaysia, comes true, the chances of qualifying for the Asian Cup for the first time in history are slim. So it is no surprise that if the next match against Vietnam, Nepal fans will turn to watching cricket more than today.