Safiq Rahim stressed the importance of making the home ground advantage for the first leg (Dec 26) count.
They chased every ball, shadowed every Vietnam move, absorbed all the pressure and at the final whistle, trooped off the My Dinh Stadium pitch with heads held high after completing a 2-0 semi-final aggregate success.
"We always believe we could reach the final, we had the confidence to do it even though we had a bad start to the tournament," said skipper Safiq Rahim in referring to the 5-1 mauling by Indonesia in a Group A match in Jakarta on Dec 1.
"Now that we are in the final, we want to go on and win the trophy. We have to make the home ground advantage for the first leg (on Dec 26) count."
Prior to the semi-finals, coach K. Rajagobal stressed on carrying out the game-plan to the letter and the Malaysian players certainly stuck to the script with a dogged performance.
Centre-backs Muslim Ahmad and Fadhli Shas, aged 21 and 19 respectively, played with maturity beyond their years and were ably supported by full-backs Sabre Mat Abu and Asraruddin Putra Omar.
Safiq curbed his offensive instinct to provide cover for the back-four, hacking away anything that Vietnam could come up with as Malaysia made the final for the first time since the inaugural tournament in 1996.
And when the defence was breached, there was the excellent Khairul Fahmi to save the day, denying Nguyen Viet Thang's point-blank header in the second half to ensure his third clean-sheet in four matches.
"That was just instinct. I was a bit lucky it came straight at me," said Khairul Fahmi, the youngest goalkeeper in the tournament at 21, of his crucial save.
"They were coming at us like crazy but we hung in there and the defenders were superb. We are all very happy and now we can't wait to create history by winning the trophy for the first time."
The ever-modest Muslim, whose aerial challenges frustrated Vietnam's attackers over the two legs, said the entire team deserved credit for reaching the final.
"I just did what the coach asked me to do. I had to pay special attention to one or two of their players and that is what I did.
"But the whole team did well, it was a team effort," said centre-back, who credited his two Slovakia stints with the Young Tigers for his fine performance in Hanoi.
From Devinder Singh in Hanoi
Read more: Tigers eye big prize http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/42afftiger/Article#ixzz18eM2KI82
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