For years football has been in China a nightmare and a source of national shame, with numerous corruption scandals. Now the country's president, Xi Jinping, the most powerful and feared leader who has had the Asian giant since Mao Zedong has been proposed to end this situation. He is a football fan since childhood and now wants to realize his childhood dream: to lead his country one day the world football.
Xi Jinping became president of China in March 2013, but two years and before, when he was vice president, advanced what their ambitions in the sport. Some yearnings that culminated in three wishes: China will qualify for the finals of a World Cup, which is the host of this tournament and to one day win the trophy.
The bar imposed by the leader of the Asian giant is very high, if the results are taken into account. So far, China has only qualified once for the finals of a World Cup, the 2002 and succeeded by the two great teams in the region, Japan and South Korea were classified as organizers of the championship.
The result was disastrous. The Chinese combined was eliminated in the first round after being defeated in three games against Brazil, Turkey and Costa Rica, and went home without scoring a single goal. And is currently ranked 82 in the FIFA rankings.
This situation has led to Xi, like hundreds of thousands of Chinese followers, day after day regret the disappointing results of the national team and to consider them an embarrassment. "A strong country in sports, have to be good at football too ,. He has said on more than one occasion the communist leader.
And since he assumed the leadership of the Asian giant has conspired to move past this stage and that China will become a power ball. To do Xi has decided to repeat the strategy used for the 2008 Olympics, which China harvested a record number of gold medals. A success because sports became a political objective.
Now Xi has made the same bet. A few months ago created a working group of high level in order to address the problem of football. The result of this work, the Chinese authorities have adopted a program to boost the sport in the country. L idea is good. However, in danger of failing because the Communist Party has designed its top-down strategy, insisting on the concept of obedience and without taking into account the factor of creativity.
At the moment, the Chinese authorities have declared football as a compulsory part of the national curriculum in primary and secondary schools. Where once traditionally taught table tennis and badminton football now be added. The goal is to build a model similar to European football in a country where many players have not practiced this sport before becoming professionals.
The plan has been launched by the Committee for Reform, one of the main institutions of the communist regime, which demonstrates the importance that Xi Jinping gives the sport of ball. Contemplate that in 2017 nearly 20,000 schools have football fields, in order to generate more than 100,000 players. They have designed programs to send more despunten abroad and expected to attract some 35 international stars in the upcoming season.
Alongside these initiatives, the plan includes theory. Chinese authorities have scheduled from September 200 million students cas game, advanced and strategic techniques to how teamwork and moral lessons.
It is not clear, however, that Xi Jinping see their wishes fulfilled. Football is a sport that requires teamwork and individual creativity and by, when the Communist Party has opted for the vertical dirigisme, with the idea that the day will come that will bring together a strong team from the talent emerging from its population of 1,400 million. Time will tell if your plan is correct or not.
