2023-06-11 04:11:00
（ＣＮＮ） In 2011, about a year before he became China’s leader, Chinese President Xi Jinping laid out his vision of making China, a footballing underdog, a footballing superpower.
Xi has set his sights on football’s highest honor, the World Cup, and has outlined a three-step plan for the men’s national team to win the World Cup. The plan is to first qualify for the World Cup for the second time, then host the World Cup in China, and finally win the World Cup.
At the time, China was not even among the top 70 nations in the world, and since it qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 1957, it has only qualified for the main tournament once. I didn’t.
But when the Chinese Football Association (CFA) announced plans in 2016 to make China a “world football superpower” by 2050, few doubted Mr Xi’s resolve. .
After that, as if to back up the words of Mr. Xi and the CFA, the amount of money invested in the Chinese football world surged, surprising players and fans around the world. Government-affiliated conglomerates and property developers that have made a fortune from China’s real estate boom have poured money into the nation’s top professional soccer league.
As a result, foreign superstars flocked to the Chinese Super League (CSL) in search of high rewards.
In time, the CSL was on par with Europe’s biggest leagues in terms of spending. In a booming 2015-2016 season, transfer fees totaled US$451 million, placing them among the top five most expensive leagues in the world.
But more than a decade after Xi first talked about his dream, Chinese football’s fortunes are plummeting as fast as they once were. Poor financial decisions, allegations of corruption among senior officials and the three-year-old coronavirus pandemic have left Chinese football in a state of disrepair.
Guangzhou Evergrande players including Ricardo Goulart heading to the AFC Champions League match in 2017
gold Rush
One example of the many challenges facing Chinese football is the influx of foreign stars. Born and raised overseas, they moved to the CSL and obtained Chinese citizenship to qualify for the Chinese men’s national team.
Quickly naturalizing overseas players with Chinese families was seen as a quick way to raise the level of Chinese football.
Nico Yenariz (now known as Li Ke), who once belonged to Arsenal in England, and Tias Browning (Chiang Guangta), who played for Everton in England, are both of Chinese descent. Made it to the China national team.
On the other hand, the naturalization of the five Brazilians, Fernando (Fei Nanduo), Aloysio (Luo Guofu), Eukeson (艾找克森), Ricardo Goulart (Galat), and Alan Carvalho (Alan), was five. controversial because it has no Chinese descent.
But skeptics will point out that they were naturalized during a boom period when money was pouring into football. In fact, all five Brazilians left China during the pandemic and only two returned.
In 2021, Goulart left China due to unpaid wages from his team, Guangzhou Evergrande, and renounced his Chinese citizenship.
Goulart isn’t the only one to give up his Chinese citizenship. Roberto Siucho, who was born and raised in Peru, is one of those who renounced his Chinese citizenship.
After joining CSL powerhouse Guangzhou Evergrande in 2019, Siucho renounced his Peruvian citizenship in order to become a Chinese citizen through his late Chinese grandfather.
A few years later, however, Siucho reacquired his Peruvian citizenship and returned to his former football club, Universitario.
The turning point was the novel coronavirus pandemic.
“2019 was a great year in China. My family was able to visit China and experience its wonders. But then the pandemic hit,” Siucho said, adding: . “(One time) I couldn’t see my family for a year and I couldn’t bring my family to China while the border was closed due to the rules. So many footballers left China.”
The new corona is a turning point
Fabio Cannavaro, who won the 2006 World Cup and was Siucho’s first coach at Guangzhou Evergrande, shared similar sentiments with state media when he stepped down as head coach of Guangzhou Evergrande in 2021. “Corona changed everything,” he said.
Other foreign players representing the CSL’s golden age also left through free transfer or mutual release. Among them are three Brazilian players, Hukki, Paulinho and Alex Teixeira. The total transfer fee for the three players was more than $150 million.
Teixeira withdrew his naturalization application and Paulinho, widely regarded as one of the greatest players in CSL history, also cited the coronavirus as a reason for his decision to leave.
Due to China’s strict “zero-corona” policy, clubs can only practice and play in “biologically safe” venues, where players have been confined for months.
“It was tough mentally to go nowhere and do nothing, but it was the only way to keep playing football,” Siucho said.
Players’ frustration grew as the virus spread across China and lockdowns were imposed, with matches often postponed. Also, even if the match could be played, it was held in a stadium with no spectators without heat, so many players became homesick.
Guangzhou Evergrande stadium under construction in March 2022
depletion of funds
While COVID-19 restrictions have forced players into a difficult life, the pandemic has also disrupted the companies that pay them.
Evergrande Group, a major Chinese real estate company, went bankrupt in 2021 after the Chinese government tightened regulations on real estate developers. The company’s bankruptcy has created the worst crisis in history for China’s property market.
Evergrande-owned men’s football team Guangzhou Evergrande was unable to pay its players’ salaries in full in 2022 and the two-time AFC Champions League champions were relegated to China’s second division. bottom.
Empty stadiums have affected not only ticket revenue, but also sponsorship deals. Conglomerates and property developers have also had less money available as the Chinese economy has taken a hit.
However, not all problems were due to the new coronavirus, and some were simply mistakes in management judgment.
In 2017, the CFA stepped up taxes on spending on foreign player acquisitions to develop Chinese talent. Specifically, it required clubs that spent more than US$7 million to pay the CFA the same amount as they spent. As a result, clubs cut their spending significantly, leading to lower attendance figures and sponsorship losses.
The impact was enormous, and clubs were forced to go out of business one after another as they struggled to balance the books and earn the high salaries of star players.
“China’s Shame”
The purpose of inviting talented foreign players to the CSL is not simply to naturalize foreign-born star players, but to raise the level of football that Chinese players are engaged in, and the effect will spread to the national team. expected.
In a bid to turn things around, Aleksandar Janković from Serbia has been appointed as the new men’s coach. It seems
Meanwhile, the women’s national team, which is underfunded compared to the men’s, is perhaps the only hope of Chinese football. The women’s national team won last year’s AFC Women’s Asian Cup and is seen as a dark horse in the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which will start in July.
The possibility of hosting the World Cup in China also seems highly unlikely at this point, given the various corruption scandals that have surfaced in Chinese football.
The Chinese Communist Party’s anti-corruption watchdog is now investigating a number of CFA officials, including former CFA president Chen Yuyuan and former China men’s national team coach Li Tie.
Du Zhaocai, who was on the board of the international football federation (FIFA), recently lost his job. In April, the toji was investigated for “suspected violation of discipline and law.”
Fans are also frustrated by the slump of the Chinese men’s national team, which lost 1-3 to Vietnam in the final Asian qualifiers for the 2022 World Cup. A video of popular actor Gong Hanlin criticizing the men’s national team has been played hundreds of millions of times on Weibo, a major social network platform in China. In the video, he said, “The football teams with annual income of 3 million, 5 million, and tens of millions can barely score goals on the pitch.” “This is a complete shame for the Chinese. I threw up.
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