The Chinese team celebrates at the 2022 Women's Asian Cup award ceremony. Xinhua News Agency release.
During the Spring Festival in 2022, the Chinese women's soccer team overcame many difficulties and won the Asian Cup again after 16 years. The spirit of the "Clanging Roses", which did not give up in the face of adversity, has excited countless Chinese people. 2023 will be an even more difficult task for the Chinese women's soccer team. In five months, they will participate in the Women's World Cup, Hangzhou Asian Games, Olympic qualifiers, three major tournaments, the schedule is intensive. 2023 will undoubtedly become the most important year after Shui Qingxia took over the Chinese women's football.
Excitement for the "Rose" in 2022
The past 2022 had special significance for Chinese women's soccer. They quickly emerged from the shadow of their Tokyo Olympics loss to beat South Korea in the Asian Cup final and win the title 16 years later. At the East Asian Cup in July, China won the runner-up spot with an unbeaten record of one win and two draws, tying the women's soccer team's best finish in the competition, even though they were mostly training.
Achievement is only one aspect, the Chinese women's soccer team's tenacious and hardworking spirit, and the attitude of never giving up the game easily are more exciting.
The 56-year-old head coach Shui Qingxia is undoubtedly the number one hero of the Chinese women's soccer team's good results. After taking over the helm after the Tokyo Olympics, she first let the players regain the fighting spirit of the older generation of women's football. Shui Qingxia emphasized that the main reason for the good performance in the Asian Cup was that the team did not give up the "Clanging Roses" on the spiritual level.
Winning the Asian Cup is of course inseparable from the players' ability to improve. In this regard, Shui Qingxia has more than once publicly encouraged players to study abroad: "I hope more players go out to see what the outside world is like, which is good for the players and the Chinese women's soccer team." In 2022, the Chinese women's soccer team has as many as 13 players playing in overseas leagues. Among them, there are both players from that year and young players from the post-00s. Many of the women's soccer players who play in overseas leagues have become the main or even core players of their teams.
The Chinese Women's Football Reform and Development Plan (2022-2035) (hereinafter referred to as the Plan), which was officially released in October 2022, is even more meaningful for the development of women's soccer in China. The plan proposes to improve the environment and atmosphere for the development of women's soccer, consolidate the foundation for the development of women's soccer, gradually improve the women's soccer league system, make the women's soccer national team at the leading level in Asia, and strive to win the 2023 Women's Soccer World Cup and the top 8 places in the 2024 Olympic Games.
In addition, the plan also proposes that through the efforts of about eight years, efforts will be made to make China's women's football team return to a world-class powerhouse, to achieve the comprehensive development of China's women's football, to significantly increase the population and socialization of women's football participation, and to make soccer a sports goal for women's universal participation.
In 2023, China's women's soccer team will have three major exams
At the end of last year, the Chinese women's soccer team trained in Haikou, where head coach Shui Qingxia recruited 27 players from domestic clubs until the Spring Festival. After the Spring Festival, the team will continue to train and prepare for the tournament, then train overseas at the end of February and play several warm-up matches. After that, they will face even more difficult and challenging matches:
The Women's World Cup, co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand, will be held from July 20 to August 20, and for the first time, the Women's World Cup will be expanded to 32 teams. China is in Group D along with new Euro champions England, European powerhouse Denmark and the play-off qualifying team (the winner of the match between Chile, Senegal and Haiti). According to the schedule, China will welcome its first group stage opponent, Denmark, on July 22, face the play-off team on July 28, and England on August 1st.
For China, this is a tough group to qualify. Due to the presence of European champions England, China's first match against Denmark will be a decisive battle regarding the qualification of the group. In the latest world rankings, Denmark is ranked 18th, similar to China. This also means that China has no time to adapt and cushion itself against a tournament like the World Cup and must get in the best shape from the first game.
After the World Cup, the Chinese women's soccer team will welcome the Hangzhou Asian Games at the end of September. As the hosts who won the Asian Cup, the Chinese team's goal is self-evident. The Chinese women's soccer team is strong enough to make it to the semifinals, but in the semifinals, they are likely to meet one of the stronger teams from Japan, North Korea or South Korea.
In November, China's women's soccer team will once again compete for qualification for the Paris Olympics, and Asia's top five will compete for two Paris Olympics qualifications. According to the rules of the competition, the qualifiers will be played in three stages. North Korea, Japan, Australia, China and South Korea, who are currently the top international rankings, will participate directly in the second stage. These five teams will be divided into three groups along with the seven teams that passed through the first stage, with the top ranked team in each group and the best finishers ranked second, before the third stage of the tournament takes place, resulting in the two teams that will make it to Paris.
Despite the difficult task, the Chinese women's soccer team has been actively preparing. At present, Chinese women's soccer team is conducting winter training in Haikou. It is understood that the winter training will be divided into two phases, highlighting physical training, highlighting the basic skills and tactical ability training of the team and players, and strengthening the construction of ideology and style of work, so as to lay a solid foundation for the realization of the goal of the three important competitions in 2023.
Shui Qingxia said during the New Year, "China's women's soccer team is developing in a better and better direction. We hope China can play its own style and the future of Chinese women's soccer will be better and better. I also hope that most of the fans will support us as always, with support and trust there will be motivation.
