When coach Choketawee Promrut steered the Thai U23 team to retain the SEA Games title at the 2015 tournament, Kiatisak Senamuang, then coach of the full national team, said: "Anyone can lead this team to the SEA Games title."
Kiatisak knew a thing or two about the team who were crowned SEA Games champions under him two years earlier at the 2013 Myanmar tournament.
The 2013 and 2015 SEA Games champions had several full national team players, including Chanathip Songkrasin, Peerapat Notechaiya and Thitipan Puangchan.
The 2013 side also had Charyl Chappuis, Kawin Thamsatchanan and Theerathon Bunmathan.
A large number of these stars are still key players of the full national team.
Unfortunately for Worrawoot Srimaka, coach of the currently SEA Games team, most of the star players from the previous two tournaments are now overaged and not eligible for the 2017 Games.
The men's football tournament at Kuala Lumpur 2017 is for U22 players.
Only a couple of Worrawoot's players are in the starting line-ups of their clubs and even captain and forward Chenrop Samphaodi is not in the first 11 of his club Police Tero.
Teams at this SEA Games can use up to three overaged players.
But Worrawoot could not use those from the full national team because they will have to play in a World Cup qualifier against Iraq on Aug 31 for which the training camp is scheduled to begin this week.
Worrawoot's team had a dismal performance at last month's AFC U23 qualifying round in Bangkok where they were held to draws by Mongolia and Indonesia and beat Malaysia.
Fortunately, the results were good enough to see Thailand advance to next year's AFC U23 Championship when they sealed the last spot for the finals as the fifth best runners-up among 10 qualifying groups.
The team carried the poor form to Kuala Lumpur as they were held to a 1-1 draw by Indonesia and could only beat minnows Timor Leste 1-0 in their first two games in Group B.
Their performance against Indonesia upset Witthaya Laohakul, the technical chief of the Football Association of Thailand (FAT), who flew to Kuala Lumpur to give advice to Worrawoot.
Witthaya saw for himself a worse performance from the Thais in their narrow win over Timor Leste.
While the draw with Indonesia was acceptable to many Thai fans as at least the Indonesians are not too bad in Southeast Asia, the victory over Timor Leste was not.
Timor Leste, who lost 4-0 to Vietnam in their opening match, were 3.5-goal underdogs against the Thais, meaning that punters needed Thailand to win by at least four goals to cash in on their bets.
Why Thailand have fared so badly at the SEA Games?
In the words of Worrawoot and other Thai officials, the pitch was slippery and many players were nervous.
In the match against Timor Leste, Thailand's poor performance was partly a result of some players lacking hearts, they said.
Indeed, Thailand have fared so badly because of their technical and tactical shortcomings.
Without drastic improvements, it will be extremely hard for Thailand to retain the crown with Vietnam, who are also in Group B, now being considered favourites to win the gold medal.
Worrawoot and his troops have another chance to win back the fans' faith when they meet another minnows, Cambodia, today.
The Thais not only need a victory, but they will need to win in impressive fashion or Worrawoot would run out of excuses.