Football

Geovane Magno takes the Việt Nam citizenship, opening a door for him to wear the national team jersey. Photo courtesy of Ninh Bình

 HÀ NỘI — Geovane Magno has officially received Vietnamese citizenship and now goes by the name Nguyễn Tài Lộc.

The Brazilian-born striker for Ninh Bình has completed the naturalisation process through long-term residency in Việt Nam, opening the door for a potential call-up to the national team.

He was the fourth foreign player to choose Việt Nam as their homeland in the last two years.

Previously, Nguyễn Xuân Sơn, Đỗ Hoàng Hên and Cao Pendant Quang Vinh took their new citizenship and were called to serve the national squad.

Lộc, 32, impressed Vietnamese football community with his remarkable technical statistics.

The 1.88m-tall player is said to be a rarely versatile talent. His skillful individual technique, speed and flexible ability to play in attack help him to perform well in various roles in all clubs that he played for such as dissolved Sài Gòn FC, Hà Nội FC, Hồng Lĩnh Hà Tĩnh and Thể Công-Viettel. 

In this V-League 1 season, Lộc has shown consistent form with seven goals and three assists in 17 matches for Ninh Bình.

Lộc, however, still needs to wait until the next season to be registered to play as a domestic player in the domestic leagues. In addition, the Việt Nam Football Federation is completing relevant procedures to submit to FIFA to request a transfer of international playing status, in order to help this player qualify for the Vietnamese national team. — VNS