Vietnam’s football team received a “rock-star” welcome in Hanoi yesterday, (1)_______ losing to Uzbekistan in the 2018 U23 Asian Championship Final. Thousands of supporters flocked to the streets from Noi Bai Airport to Hanoi’s city center to greet the team bus, (2)________the Vietnamese PM’s reception for the team by five hours. A home-coming celebration was also held at My Dinh National Stadium, where all 40,000 seats were filled with thousands more waiting outside to see the players. Their ...

Vietnam’s football team received a “rock-star” welcome in Hanoi yesterday, (1)_______ losing to Uzbekistan in the 2018 U23 Asian Championship Final. Thousands of supporters flocked to the streets from Noi Bai Airport to Hanoi’s city center to greet the team bus, (2)________the Vietnamese PM’s reception for the team by five hours. A home-coming celebration was also held at My Dinh National Stadium, where all 40,000 seats were filled with thousands more waiting outside to see the players. Their (3)______ at the U23 Asian Cup made the players “overnight celebrities in the football-crazy nation”, AFP wrote. Various Korean outlets, including Korea Times, Sportal Korea and Hani, have also expressed amazement at the way football fans have celebrated their national team’s achievement, and at the same time, hailed the team’s performance at the tournament (4)_____ “heroic” and “like a fairy tale”.

According to Sportal Korea, the team made an “impressive achievement” at the Asian tournament. “The red flags were being waved everywhere on the streets, and the cheering went on until late,” Hani wrote. The Korea Times also added that Vietnam’s success at the Asian Cup had brought Vietnamese football and Korean football “closer”. More importantly, it is the success (5)_____unites the country on so many levels.