Song Lam Nghe An after a string of nine unbeaten matches continue to lead the first half of the national football championship, V-League, which ended last week.

The central team took 29 points from 13 matches, putting them four points clear of second place Da Nang and third placed Dong Thap.

However, the 2001 champions also amassed a shocking 38 yellow cards.

The first half of the V-League season attracted average attendances of 8,000 fans per match, the Viet Nam Football Federation said at a press conference yesterday.

Players scored 258 goals in 91 V-League matches, an average of 2.86 goals per game.

The Viet Nam Football Federation’s (VFF) vice chairman, Nguyen Lan Trung, said the first half had seen 78 matches televised live.

“VFF and cable TV provider Audio Vision Global (AVG) plan to broadcast live all the V-League’s 182 matches next year,” Trung said

Last year’s top scorer Argentinean Gaston Merlo of Da Nang heads the V-League’s top-scorer list with 12 goals, beating Nigerian Samson Kayode of Dong Thap and Brazilian Evaldo Goncaves, who scored 10 goals each.

At the press conference, VFF’s vice general secretary Duong Nghiep Khoi also warned that V-League’s organising committee would tighten security at stadia, and monitor match-fixing in the second half of the season.

“The organising committee has yet to spot a game with signs of match-fixing, but we’ll continue to monitor the matches for any signs of tampering,” Khoi said.

As scheduled, the second half of the season will resume next Saturday.

Following the league’s renovation in 2000, all 14 V-League clubs are now owned by businesses, including Dong Tam-Long An, Binh Duong, Hoang Anh Gia Lai, Hai Phong, Hoa Phat and Ha Noi T&T.

Source: VNS