On March 18, Beijing time, the Chinese men's soccer team had its last training session before Singapore in Shenzhen. Before the match, national soccer coach Ivankovic gave an interview to the media and said that it was significant that Ickerson was included in the roster.
As for the team's 26-man roster, Ivan said, "This time, we also chose 31 people to enter the training list in order to see more players' performance. Shandong's players were late. Finally, some of our players were injured. Li Shuai and Li Ang are both injured, so they won't be going to Singapore with us. Xie Wenneng's situation is special, he's still doing well, but in the national team, there are many candidates for his position and the type is similar. That's why we asked him to report to the Olympic training camp first, so he can better prepare for the U23 Asian Cup. Zhao Bo's performance is also very good, but this time the number is limited, I believe he will come back for the June training. Li Ke was injured before the season and has just recovered, his form is not yet at its best. We have other options in the midfield, such as Wang Shangyuan, Gao Junyi and Gao Tianyi. So we made a choice."
As for Eckerson's injury, Ivan said, "At the beginning of training camp, Eckerson came in and we discussed it with him at length. As a result of the discussion with him, he underwent physical therapy for his knee injury and is now largely recovered. Maybe he doesn't have the ability to play 90 minutes, but we believe that if he plays five or 10 minutes, he can have a positive impact on the team. We don't have a lot of options at striker so his arrival means a lot to us."
