Sports thread: Everything sport related here.

Quickie

Colonel
There's something wrong with the entire system of men's team sports in China. Saying it's genetics doesn't make sense considering east Asians and hell South East Asians don't have the same issues.

Until the root cause is found and addressed, the pain will not stop.

I agree genetics isn't an issue other than short-sightedness, which may also have environmental causes. It's troublesome for most sports, but especially with having to do the header with football. More than 80% of students in China are short-sighted when they reach Senior High (16 to 18 years old). But then again, the Koreans and Japanese probably have the same issues.
 

mellowcookie

Just Hatched
Registered Member
I agree genetics isn't an issue other than short-sightedness, which may also have environmental causes. It's troublesome for most sports, but especially with having to do the header with football. More than 80% of students in China are short-sighted when they reach Senior High (16 to 18 years old). But then again, the Koreans and Japanese probably have the same issues.
Short-Sightedness is nearly entirely caused by environmental factors, in particular a lack of sunlight exposed to eyes. Previously it was thought to be caused by looking at too close objects, but recent research has shown a lack of sunlight leads to a lack of a growth stopping hormone within the eyeball. This leads to the eyeball continuing to grow longer, like an olive, leading to short-sightedness. This is a concern for all recent generations of people across the world, but is especially exacerbated in China. If you look at the way Chinese children are raised, it makes total sense - 12 + hours spent in a classroom for most of the day, with little outside exercise time.
 

GulfLander

Major
Registered Member
I think people are underestimating the gargantuan time and resouces that are needed to be a world class footballing nation nowadays. It's equivalent to catching up in the semi conductor industry. Why? The elite football nations has literally a hundred years head start, have massive leagues in term of knowledge or tactical base and training methods and facilities. European football is like the Warring States (or Spring and Autumn) period of Chinese history. Huuuge amount of talent, money and most importantly, the most leading edge of tactical thinking and refinement is coursing through it, under the most intense of competition.

Just look at the succesful Asian nations, like Japan or Korea. The Europeans look at them the same way ancient Chinese look at Korea and Japan, yes, good learners, but are to be crushed when faced in competition.

Just like the discussions in Soft Power, this is a fools errand. Make China the mightiest and wealthiest nation on earth, then we can choose which sport entertainment we want to excel in, or better yet create a better sport, where we make the rules, and others can aspire to join our sports.

In the mean time, it's not like China has zero to look forward to in sports. We have the Olympics, and I may add that can be considered as a "team event" too, when considered as a whole.
Would having a league per each province, then a national league for provincial champs, increase compeitiveness/ participation/ engagement? Like formatted to European football, but instead of states, the provinces? Would that encourage building more football fields etc?
 

Shaolian

Junior Member
Registered Member
Would having a league per each province, then a national league for provincial champs, increase compeitiveness/ participation/ engagement? Like formatted to European football, but instead of states, the provinces? Would that encourage building more football fields etc?
In my opinion, China doesn't need to bother itself anymore than it currently does with the game of football. Resources are better put to discovering how to compete at Olympics sports, the ones that test human physical limits. These physical abilities will come in handy in the game of football too in the future.

If we really want to put some resources into an existing team sport, I'd like it to be volleyball. The women game is already world class. The men's game can have the potential to be as well. Volleyball can also be a money making industry if China can produce a competitive professional league. Also, volleyball leagues around the world are not as developed or entrenched as football. It'll be much easier for China to attract world class players to play in its league. In volleyball China has potential to define what a world class professional league can be.
 

GulfLander

Major
Registered Member
Curious, this video use different Syria flag on its thumbnail vs the flag in the video title?
The thumbnail seem to use the "current flag"? But for the likes of afghanistan they still use old flags?

 

jshw31

New Member
Registered Member
In my opinion, China doesn't need to bother itself anymore than it currently does with the game of football. Resources are better put to discovering how to compete at Olympics sports, the ones that test human physical limits. These physical abilities will come in handy in the game of football too in the future.

If we really want to put some resources into an existing team sport, I'd like it to be volleyball. The women game is already world class. The men's game can have the potential to be as well. Volleyball can also be a money making industry if China can produce a competitive professional league. Also, volleyball leagues around the world are not as developed or entrenched as football. It'll be much easier for China to attract world class players to play in its league. In volleyball China has potential to define what a world class professional league can be.
Depends on the goal of sports, be it purely economic or as a symbol of prestige. Volleyball certainly is a better bang for the buck economic proposition for the reasons as you mentioned, but sports are generally enjoyed for it's symbolicism/prestige. Frankly, soccer is a "world" sport, and there is value in being successful in a popular, standardized worldwide competition, same as the olympics. It may or may not improve China's image externally, but its likely that improving in soccer can foster more healthy internal nationalism and confidence. Being good as a less popular sport like volleyball doesn't hurt, but like India being good at cricket, holds much less importance.
 

Randomuser

Senior Member
Registered Member
Depends on the goal of sports, be it purely economic or as a symbol of prestige. Volleyball certainly is a better bang for the buck economic proposition for the reasons as you mentioned, but sports are generally enjoyed for it's symbolicism/prestige. Frankly, soccer is a "world" sport, and there is value in being successful in a popular, standardized worldwide competition, same as the olympics. It may or may not improve China's image externally, but its likely that improving in soccer can foster more healthy internal nationalism and confidence. Being good as a less popular sport like volleyball doesn't hurt, but like India being good at cricket, holds much less importance.
Of course being good at football is what's wanted as the end goal. But more importantly, I think the big lesson is to find a model/template to develop a team sports infrastructure. Once you have a working model, you can use it for other team sports.

That's why China always has these "breakthroughs" and afterwards success at a mass level follows.
 

PeoplesPoster

Junior Member
In my opinion, China doesn't need to bother itself anymore than it currently does with the game of football. Resources are better put to discovering how to compete at Olympics sports, the ones that test human physical limits. These physical abilities will come in handy in the game of football too in the future.

If we really want to put some resources into an existing team sport, I'd like it to be volleyball. The women game is already world class. The men's game can have the potential to be as well. Volleyball can also be a money making industry if China can produce a competitive professional league. Also, volleyball leagues around the world are not as developed or entrenched as football. It'll be much easier for China to attract world class players to play in its league. In volleyball China has potential to define what a world class professional league can be.
no one really cares about the olympics at this point outside of a select few sports and countries. Team sports are much more popular and have larger cultural and economic importance around the world.
 

supersnoop

Major
Registered Member
China could check by replacing all players in the football (and basketball maybe) team with guys of African descent. I mean European and Middle eastern teams do this anyway so it's not new. If still no result, then we can see it's not a genetic problem and instead the entire system has terminal cancer and needs to be put out of its misery.

Too bad China could never perform such experiments to find the root cause.
I know you are joking, but there are not even any major African-Chinese athletes. There are probably more African Japanese athletes. Again it’s ridiculous because just statistically there has to be more in China. There are probably more in Jamaica than Japan, lol (ie. Kyle Anderson/Li).

But it's not just men's football. China at men's team sports sucks generally. At least football is the most competitive sports in the world so there's an excuse. Meanwhile men Chinese basketball isn't even best in Asia either and has gotten worse over the years.

Football is competitive so ok the team can suck. But it shouldn't apply to all team sports. There is something seriously wrong with the approach which could highlight real underlying problem on attitude towards teamwork. Something we cannot ignore in today's world. It's something that needs to be addressed.

Cuba has a good baseball team and the USSR had a good ice hockey team. So even those authoritative commie countries don't need to live with such humiliation.
The system is complete garbage. The former Yugoslavia continues to produce NBA level players despite the country completely falling apart and killing each other for a good 10 years. It goes far beyond teamwork. If you were just bad at developing teamwork, then the naturally you can still produce elite singular talents. Basketball requires a good team to be elite, but an elite player has a far bigger impact than other team sports. China has neither a good team, nor elite talent.

The second more fundamental issue is that Chinese football is just too lucrative no matter how shit they are. It’s the only major field in China that is allowed to be too big to fail where money pours in no matter the results. So there is no real incentive to change as there is no real serious punishment for failure.

These two problems compound each other in that even if the Chinese messi is found by scouts and put into a training program, his potential will be limited by the sea of mediocrity around him. He won’t ever get to meet his own full potential because he is already king of the tiny Chinese football hill at 1% of his power.
This part shouldn’t matter. To get to those levels of excellence requires a certain kind of commitment and dedication. A Chinese Messi wouldn’t be happy being a big fish in a small pond, they would go play in the European leagues. That is how to get better. That is the kind of attitude that it takes to be the best. If they don't have that attitude, they will never achieve to the highest levels.

In my opinion, China doesn't need to bother itself anymore than it currently does with the game of football. Resources are better put to discovering how to compete at Olympics sports, the ones that test human physical limits. These physical abilities will come in handy in the game of football too in the future.
At some point you need to get better at identifying the elite traits. You can train 95% of physical abilities, lift weights, eat right, cardio, etc. It is that 5% that makes the difference. Almost all elite athletes are playing multiple sports when they grow up, and dominate their regular peers until they hit the mid-teens (running faster, jumping higher, etc.). At that point, that small difference will push them into one sport over the other. You look at the former Canadian basketball payer Steve Nash, he loved football (soccer) and was the best in his high school, but in the end he is in the basketball hall of fame.
 
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