Recently, the most nagging thing for our Chinese fans is undoubtedly the Asian Games match between the national soccer team and South Korea. Before this game, our national soccer team played two games against this South Korean team. The first game was a 1-3 loss. Obviously, the other team felt the pressure from the other team, but we still scored. In the second game, we beat our opponents 1-0, which was a tenacious comeback from being passive all over the field. Therefore, everyone had reason to believe that our AFC would play this game well. Even if they don't win, they can show effort.
But this expectation might be shattered in the first half as we found that we couldn't put any offensive pressure on Korea, no hardness and aggression in defense, and no threat of counterattack. In short, we were played like a scarecrow by Korea, which really disappointed many fans. Of course, the final score was a reasonable one relative to the strengths of both sides. But our players really lost the chance to shine with high level opponents because we had no swords at all.
But our players can actually learn a lot from this game, because the other team has a few players who play in the top five leagues, and the calmness they show, the rhythm they play and the confrontation they play against is something we can't experience in the Chinese Super League. So, no matter what the result or the process is, if our players can learn something from it, so that they can understand soccer better, this game is valuable.
Recently, we can see the effect of this. The team's main striker is also the hero of Qatar after the Asian Games team finished their own journey. Tao Qianglong was interviewed by Sportsweek. He revealed his voice and reset his goals. He said:- "We have a gap with the Korean team in all aspects, including technique, body, confrontation and mind. Lee Gang-in, for example, is different from us in every aspect. After all, he is a player from the top league in Europe. Look at the pace of his game (how fast and strong) and feel free to relax later. Let's just say the gap is really big so that we can keep working hard.
We should know that Tao Qianglong was selected as one of the world's top 60 rising stars by the British Guardian in 2001, together with Li Gangren. However, today's development is very different. Li Gangren is playing for Ligue 1 giants Paris, while Tao Qianglong can only substitute in the Chinese Super League. This huge gap is embarrassing. So Tao Qianglong will adjust his goals now that he sees the gap between each other. After all, Tao Qianglong is only 21 years old at the moment and has a lot of hope for the future.
So do we expect Tao Qianglong to go out one day? Chinese players now need fast-paced, high confrontation, high level league training. The only way to achieve that now is to go out. Are you optimistic about Tao Qianglong studying abroad?
