China's performance in the group stage of the U.S.-Canada-Mexico World Cup qualifying tournament last month was one win and one loss. While they beat Thailand 2-1 on the road, they lost 0-3 at home to South Korea in the second group stage, meanwhile Thailand thrashed Singapore 3-1 on the road. As a result, China is currently third in the group on goal difference.
In this way, the next two matches between the national soccer team and the Singaporean team become particularly important. Especially in the third round away match against Singapore, the national football team must win and try to score as many goals as possible, in order to hope to regain the chance to get out of the group.
Judging from the performance in the past two group matches of the World Qualification Tournament, all the players of the national soccer team have played with great efforts, but the problems at the attacking end are still very prominent. Yankovic has set up a 343 formation for the national football team, and according to this tactical system, the role of the center forward appears to be very crucial.
Zhang Yuning has just recently recovered from injury, while Guo Tianyu's professional soccer career is essentially over, meaning that the current national team does not have a particularly good center forward to field. Ackerson has proven that he is no longer able to play as the team's main striker, either in Chengdu Rongcheng or for the national team, prior to his naturalization.
As a result, Jankovic decided not to use Ackerson and chose 35-year-old veteran Tan Long as the main striker of the national team. Although Tan Long performed quite well in the Asian Games for the national team, the World Qualifiers and the Asian Games are not on the same level. As a result, Tan Long had a tough time in the world qualifiers, especially against South Korea, and his contribution to the team was almost nil except for two shots that hit the goal frame.
The next step for Jankovic, who intends to lead the national soccer team to back-to-back victories, will be to replace Tan Long and tweak the forward line. Zhang Yuning has returned from injury and is undoubtedly the first choice for the starting center forward for the national soccer team. The two wing positions, on the other hand, continue to be filled by Wu Lei and Wei Shihao.
Wu Lei has excellent running ability in the game, so he can play an important role in sports and counter-attacks when attacking. Wei Shihao, on the other hand, stands out due to his quickness and breakthrough ability, which can bring great threat to the opponent's goal, no matter whether it's a center pass after passing to the bottom line or a breakthrough into the penalty area after cutting inside.
Next January, the national soccer team will participate in the 2024 Asian Cup in Qatar ahead of their World Cup qualifier against Singapore. They will play three group games against Tajikistan, Lebanon and hosts Qatar. All three teams are strong, and Qatar is particularly tough as a home team.
If the national soccer team is unable to start the first two rounds of the group stage and gain enough points, it will be difficult to take advantage of Qatar in the final round. As a result, there is a possibility that the national soccer team will not advance to the knockout rounds.
If the national team performs poorly in the Asian Cup, then Jankovic may have trouble keeping his coaching job. After all, new FA president Song Kai has already expressed his interest in hiring a German coach to coach the national team.
If Jankovic is dismissed, the player lineup of the national soccer team will be changed. There will be a huge uncertainty if they want to win the World Cup away against Singapore.
However, the Singaporean team is very limited, and their performance has been unsatisfactory in both offense and defense. In the past two group matches of the World Preliminary League, they lost 0-5 to South Korea and 1-3 to Thailand at home. The results of these two matches showed that Singapore's players are very poor, as they only scored 1 goal while conceding 8.
Nonetheless, the Chinese national soccer team needs to remain vigilant and not be in any kind of cavalier frame of mind. After all, we have suffered many defeats in major Asian competitions in the past. The match will also be broadcast live on CCTV5, the CCTV sports channel, so let's wait and see if we can manage to beat Singapore on the road...
