V-League champs Binh Duong have made history by becoming the first Vietnamese club to reach the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Cup quarterfinals after thrashing Malaysian champs Kedah 8-2 at Go Dau Stadium Tuesday.

Despite not playing well in the V-League and standing in the middle of the table, Binh Duong showed a different face Tuesday.

Coach Mai Duc Chung made some tactical shifts by putting Phong Hoa and Van Hai on both flanks and placing Cong Minh alongside the experienced Truong Giang in the midfield.

After taking a few minutes to warm up, Binh Duong launched a series of attacks and put the visitors under constant pressure.

Kedah, who have been champions of Malaysia for two consecutive years, looked weak. They counterattacked but their defenders played badly.

The home team found the opener 18 minutes into the match as Brazilian defender Helio headed home a Vu Phong pass from the right flank.

Vu Phong himself took advantage of Kedah’s weakness to delight more than 20,000 home fans by doubling the score less than two minutes later.

Phong’s shot was not very powerful but Kedah goalie Helmi Eliza could only grab the ball after it had crossed the baseline.

Seeing it was getting easy for the home team, coach Chung put Duc Thien in to replace Phong so that the latter could save his energy for the upcoming V-League clash against Hai Phong this weekend.

Thien proved a good sub on the left flank. He maintained good possession of the ball before sending a pass to Huynh Kesley who netted the third goal for Binh Duong, Thien himself followed with the fourth before halftime to end any hope Kedah might have had of making a match of it.

The match looked complete after the first half, so the two teams played comfortably in the second.

Binh Duong scored four more goals, with Kesley scoring a second-half hat-trick to take his personal tally to four, and Anh Duc finding the net to post the eighth goal. Kedah’s Shahrulnizam and Bin Ahmah score a brace of consolation goals.

Binh Duong has also become the first Vietnamese team to score eight goals in one match at the Asian competition.

After the match, the 20,000 home fans stayed on to celebrate the victory while Kedah coach Abdullah said, “We tried our best but Binh Duong was very strong. I believe Binh Duong will advance far into the AFC Cup this year.”

Reported by Quang Huy