Japanese Coach Arrives at V-League

Becamex TP.HCM officially registered Japanese coach Ueno Nobuhiro to lead the team starting from round 12 of the V-League. Mr. Đặng Trần Chỉnh stepped back to the role of Technical Director cum team manager but remains a key figure in technical matters.

Becamex TP.HCM club has completed the procedure to change the coaching staff for the V-League. According to the new registration, Mr. Ueno Nobuhiro will take the position of head coach and begin his duties from round 12, during the away match at Hồng Lĩnh Hà Tĩnh’s stadium. Meanwhile, Mr. Đặng Trần Chỉnh moved to the role of technical director and team manager but is still expected to have a significant influence on technical work.

Born in 1965 in Shiga, Japan, Coach Ueno arrived in Vietnam in September 2024. He previously worked at Tươi Bình Phước School during the time when coach Nguyễn Anh Đức was still in charge. When Mr. Anh Đức left Bình Phước to return to the Bình Dương region, Ueno was also invited to join Becamex TP.HCM’s coaching staff as an assistant before the team underwent personnel changes.

The coaching change happened after coach Nguyễn Anh Đức was released due to not meeting performance expectations. Since then, Mr. Đặng Trần Chỉnh was assigned as interim coach but acknowledged facing certification barriers: he does not hold the AFC Pro coaching license, making it difficult to meet the AFC’s requirements for the head coach position from the 2025/26 season. This is considered one of the reasons Becamex TP.HCM needed a “qualified” candidate to register according to regulations.

Throughout his career, Mr. Ueno has held management and operational roles and participated in football organizations at several Japanese clubs such as Fukuyama City, Kagoshima United, Ventforet Kofu, and Renofa Yamaguchi. However, within the current team’s internal context, many sources suggest that Ueno’s registration as “head coach” may be a technical formality, while the daily technical coordination will still prominently involve Mr. Đặng Trần Chỉnh.

Notably, Becamex TP.HCM continues to show a trend of employing Japanese personnel. Before Ueno, the team also added an experienced expert, Naoki Kusunose – former coach of the Urawa Red Diamonds women's team – to the technical staff.

After a period of upheaval, Becamex TP.HCM is showing signs of improvement. The team earned 7 points in the last 4 matches (7 out of 12 points) and rose to 8th place after 11 rounds. The upcoming match against Hồng Lĩnh Hà Tĩnh in round 12 is seen as an important debut for Mr. Ueno and a test for the new management model: a nominal Japanese head coach with a Vietnamese technical director managing the technical rhythm behind the scenes.