In today's Korean press, the upcoming East Asian Cup is in the spotlight, and our team's preparations are naturally in the spotlight.
A report noted that two months ago, the Chinese Football Association (CFA) made a decisive decision to send the U23 national team to Japan to participate in the East Asian Cup in July, with the initial intention of allowing the U23 national team to sharpen for the upcoming Hangzhou Asian Games.
But the postponement of the Hangzhou Asian Games has brought new challenges for our team. While the U23 national team, coached by Jankovic, will continue to compete, the topic of whether to bring in veterans to join the team has sparked heated discussions.
Initially, the country planned to call up players such as Wu Xi, Zhang Linpeng and Zhang Yuning to join the U23 team for the East Asian Cup, however, times have changed.
With our failure to feature in the Qatar World Cup and the lack of any A-Level tournaments this year, the East Asian Cup has become the only stage where we can fight for points. If we do not perform well in the East Asian Cup, our ranking in FIFA will drop further, which will have a negative impact on the future Asian Cup and World Cup qualifiers. Currently, we are ranked 78th in FIFA and 11th in Asia.
