Chinks Want To Win World Cup!! Bring Glory To Motherland and Mao!!

[JohnTan]

By Clare Jim and Adam Jourdan

HONG KONG/SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Wang Shijie, 11, is a rising star among the nearly 3,000 students at Guangzhou Evergrande's huge soccer academy in south China. He wants to join the national team and help achieve President Xi Jinping's dream of winning the World Cup.

In schools like this around the country, China is training an army of young players it hopes will help the nation shake off its lowly place in the world's football ladder: 84th out of 209 countries, just above Qatar and below teams like Jordan, Montenegro and Gabon.

"When I join the national team, I will do my best to help China become World Cup champions," Wang, wearing golden-coloured boots and a yellow jersey, told Reuters during a break in training at the school that has 50 full-size pitches and coaches flown in from European giant Real Madrid.

Led by Xi, an avid fan, China has clearly made it a goal to become a soccer superpower. A consortium led by state-backed China Media Capital took a $400 million stake last week in the owner of English Premier League champions Manchester City - Beijing's biggest investment in the sport overseas.

The tie-up will help Abu Dhabi-owned City tap the fast-growing sports and entertainment market in the world's most populous nation, and at the same time give China international soccer knowhow, on the field and off.
"The Chinese government wanted to make a statement," said Alexander Jarvis, chairman of Blackbridge Cross Borders, which brokers deals between Chinese investors and European teams.

Jarvis said he was currently working on six deals with Chinese firms looking to buy into clubs in Europe - including in England, Germany and Spain - and that there would be even bigger Chinese investment in 2016, usually with a China-based soccer school or training base thrown in.

"Pretty much every football club which has some type of deal with the Chinese will have an academy. It's very much Xi's long-term dream of World Cup glory, and building the infrastructure on the ground is exactly what they want."
Guangzhou Evergrande, coached by World Cup-winning Brazilian Luiz Felipe Scolari, are current Asian club champions but China's national team has a long way to go to World Cup glory. Even in Asia, fierce rivals Japan and South Korea have a far stronger reputation in the game.

The only time China qualified for the finals of the World Cup was in 2002, when the tournament was jointly hosted by South Korea and Japan. China was dismissed at the group stage without scoring a goal and conceding nine.
Its hopes of qualifying for the 2018 finals have been dealt a blow after a goalless draw with tiny Hong Kong last month.

There is no evidence that investing in football clubs overseas has contributed to any Asian soccer team's prowess. Businessmen from Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, India and China all have stakes in European clubs.


AMBITIOUS GOALS
But if the investments help improve China's soccer infrastructure, it could lead the way to a successful bid to host the World Cup finals, sports executives say. The home nation automatically qualifies for the tournament.
For the clubs, China is a huge, still untapped market for fans, merchandise sales and TV audiences.The country aims to grow its sports market to 5 trillion yuan ($782 billion) by 2025, around a five-fold leap from its current size, and football will play a big part.

That's good news for franchises tapping into local media distribution rights, sponsorship and merchandising. It's also a boon for sports-focused companies such as adidas AG and Nike Inc.

"The willingness to pay for sports isn't limited to watching them; membership at sports clubs is up, as is the amount people are willing to spend on sporting equipment," said Liu Yue, a former national football player and now a commentator.

Increasingly, the way into China's football market is made easier by promoting the local game. Germany's adidas and former Brazil star Ronaldo have launched football academies and England's David Beckham is an "ambassador" for Chinese football. Premier League and other European clubs regularly visit China in their summer off-season, drawing huge crowds.

Chinese authorities are squarely behind the drive to develop local football, providing the vital political support to the move. Local governments have helped subsidise television licence fees to support local teams, while the recent Manchester City deal was led by a state-backed firm.

Xi himself visited City's academy last month during a trip to Britain, where he posed for a selfie with Argentinian striker Sergio Aguero and British Prime Minister David Cameron.

However, corruption and player quality remain serious hurdles in Chinese football. A crackdown to clean up the game has seen at least nine officials, four judges, 13 footballers or coaches and 17 club workers jailed or punished since 2009.

"A short-term goal for China is to gain a leading role in Asia," said Fernando Sanchez Cipitria, technical director at the academy in Guangdong and a former midfielder for Spain.

"For China to win the World Cup it could be a long journey."

(Additional reporting by Sue-Lin Wong in BEIJING and Tyrone Siu and Venus Wu in HONG KONG; Writing by Adam Jourdan; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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https://sg.sports.yahoo.com/news/fo...d-cup-064553325--finance.html?linkId=19446561

 

[Leongsam]

Chinks win the world cup???? that's a good one. Joke of the year 2015.

 

[Narong Wongwan]

Anyone remembered mabok tan's 2010 World Cup qualification ?

 

[Sideswipe]

China invented football. the World should thank them for this great sport.

 

[yellowarse]

First they have to wipe out corruption at all levels of the game, especially in their domestic league. Japanese and Korean players playing in the Chinese league will tell you that the standard of Chinese players (individually) are on a par with the Japs and Koreans, and that Chinese league games are actually played at a faster pace.

Professionalize the game at highest levels – top coaches, top foreigners (with quotas), top physiotherapists, competitive salaries to keep local talent, rigorous certification for local officials.

Market your league aggressively in the region – take a leaf out of the Premier League. Revenues churned out through merchandising and broadcast rights must be channelled into youth academies.

Then they'll have to seriously start grooming talent at a young age and feed them into the domestic league, so as not to fall into the British trap of having top foreigners dominating the BPL and squeezing out locals.

It will take China another 2 decades to challenge for the World Cup at the top level. Just a matter of time, if the necessary political will is mustered.

 

[Agoraphobic]

Very ambitious indeed!

It is good to set a target, but first, the country, and more importantly, the youth - is there a love for the sport? Is there a culture where young boys aspire to become good at the game? To want to outdo the rest in their school/village? Does the society want and push their sons to achieve these ambitions? I have not lived in serious soccer countries, but in Canada, where Ice Hockey is the country's most watched and loved game, you see that parents gear and groom their sons from the time they are able to walk to play the game and join leagues, and proudly take them to games to nurture their love for the game. If they can make it to the professional leagues, it is a dream come true for their parents, who'd be boastful of their son's "achievement" and becomes an admirable icon to his relatives and friends! It is a component of their culture. I take it in the great soccer nations of the world, the same can be said for talented soccer players. From this pool of individuals, comes a great team. Does this attitude exist in China?

Cheers!

 

[Narong Wongwan]

Very ambitious indeed!

It is good to set a target, but first, the country, and more importantly, the youth - is there a love for the sport? Is there a culture where young boys aspire to become good at the game? To want to outdo the rest in their school/village? Does the society want and push their sons to achieve these ambitions? I have not lived in serious soccer countries, but in Canada, where Ice Hockey is the country's most watched and loved game, you see that parents gear and groom their sons from the time they are able to walk to play the game and join leagues, and proudly take them to games to nurture their love for the game. If they can make it to the professional leagues, it is a dream come true for their parents, who'd be boastful of their son's "achievement" and becomes an admirable icon to his relatives and friends! It is a component of their culture. I take it in the great soccer nations of the world, the same can be said for talented soccer players. From this pool of individuals, comes a great team. Does this attitude exist in China?

Cheers!

You're right. China is not a soccer nation.
They can produce world beaters in many other sports but can't do the same with soccer.
For the most populated country in the world they can't even come up with a decent XI.
It all boils down to culture and political will.

 

[syed putra]

If pig skins win world cup, FIFA really corrupted.

 

[Rogue Trader]

It will take China another 2 decades to challenge for the World Cup at the top level. Just a matter of time, if the necessary political will is mustered.

That was about the same amount of time the world expected America to become a serious contender after USA'94. USA has even more favourable conditions to become a football superpower but they have yet to meet everyone's expectations.

In 20 years if China can qualify regularly in the WC finals, it would already be considered a success.

 

[Rogue Trader]

If pig skins win world cup, FIFA really corrupted.

Haha... Please read the news bang. Fifa is already corrupted

 

[yellowarse]

That was about the same amount of time the world expected America to become a serious contender after USA'94. USA has even more favourable conditions to become a football superpower but they have yet to meet everyone's expectations.

While the US has better infrastructure and less corruption, it never had a real soccer culture. Soccer is still a fringe sport there, played by schoolgirls (they're a world power in the female game), Hispanics and immigrants in the southern states. American sport is still largely about basketball, baseball, American football and ice hockey.

China has a much bigger talent pool, the nation is actually soccer-mad (if you look at the World Cup and BPL fever there), and a strong domestic league. They just have to summon political will and get their act together: less corruption, more fields and stadiums, more youth development.

 

[Rogue Trader]

While the US has better infrastructure and less corruption, it never had a real soccer culture. Soccer is still a fringe sport there, played by schoolgirls (they're a world power in the female game), Hispanics and immigrants in the southern states. American sport is still largely about basketball, baseball, American football and ice hockey.

China has a much bigger talent pool, the nation is actually soccer-mad (if you look at the World Cup and BPL fever there), and a strong domestic league. They just have to summon political will and get their act together: less corruption, more fields and stadiums, more youth development.

It's much easier for them to build hardware but fostering software is the most difficult. China has no lack of big stadiums. I was in Tianjin regularly for work last year and I always walked past the impressive TEDA stadium. Problem was it was ALWAYS EMPTY. Imagine a 100,000+ capacity stadium that has rarely been used since Beijing 2008! Any Chinese I know can tell you all about the BPL, la liga and their national team. But not many play the game at grassroots level. Maybe they're just into betting.

A friend of mine revealed to me that while all professional players want to don national colours, their motivation is wrong. All of them are playing for money and not for national pride. If China wants to be a serious contender for the WC, it must produce the real pros like Ibrahamovics, Christiano ronaldos, Lampards et al. I guess making $$$ is still the national past-time in China, not football.