Although Yao Xia and Wei Qun had shown remarkable strength in the A-League, they unfortunately passed by the national team and missed the World Cup feast. In that World Cup, the appearance of the national football team was regarded as the beginning of revitalization by many fans. But who would have guessed that in 2002, the Chinese team would become the top team in terms of strength. However, in the 20 years since then, the men's soccer team's performance has fallen, even the threshold of the World Cup has not been able to step into, and even reduced to third-rate in Asia.
Today's national soccer team's starting lineup, even with players such as Wu Lei, Zhang Yuning and Li Lei who have furthered their education in Europe, rarely have anyone who can stand alone and play a key role, making the team tend to be mediocre. 2019 has seen the FA try to bring in foreign players to bolster its strength, with six naturalized players joining the roster, including Ekerson, Jiang Guangtai, Fernando, Allan, Luo Guofu and Li Ke.
Fans were once full of expectations for the national football team to rush to the World Cup, but the current chairman of the Football Association, Chen Xuyuan, and the national team head coach, Li Tie, were biased against the naturalized players, and in addition to Jiang Guangtai, Aixen, Alan and Luo Guofu were difficult to get a stable chance to play, which made the talent of these players wasted. This wrong strategy made the theoretically strongest national soccer team sink in the qualifying rounds, and once again, the World Cup did not have a chance to qualify for the World Cup.
Looking back and comparing with the current situation, the development of Chinese soccer urgently needs a clear idea to make full use of the existing resources. Especially when dealing with naturalized players, their strengths should be brought into full play instead of creating artificial barriers. Thankfully, the new FA leadership team has realized this and restarted the player naturalization program.
In addition, the CFA also needs to increase investment in soccer youth training to lay a solid foundation for talent. Only in this way can we expect Chinese soccer to revitalize and return to the glorious stage of the World Cup!
