After losing to Vietnam, U22 China was harshly criticized by fans

And yesterday, after the friendly match between the home team and U22 Vietnam ended, many Chinese football fans repeated Fan Zhiyi's words as a prophecy about the stagnation of the country's football as well as the remarkable progress of the small neighbor.

In fact, in China, it is not that football is not a sport that receives much attention and investment. The Chinese President once publicly shared three wishes for the country's football: That is, the Chinese people must build a football team that is qualified to host the World Cup, qualified to organize the World Cup, and finally, most importantly, capable of winning the World Cup.

The Chinese president is a person with a special interest in football. Photo: New China

In addition, China also had 20,000 football schools in 2017, providing more than 100,000 players and this number will double by 2025. That will help the country be able to host the World Cup within the next 15 years. And of course, the ambition to win the championship.

However, the truth is that even though tens of thousands of football schools have been opened, they are still places where people extort money from parents who want to send their children there. And in the most populous country in the world, football is not the sport that most people are interested in, but basketball.

In China, basketball is the most popular sport. Photo: CBA

There is an interesting detail that after the situation where central defender Bui Tien Dung kicked the last 11m penalty into the net of U23 Iraq to help U23 Vietnam advance to the semi-finals and took off his shirt to celebrate, many Chinese netizens immediately used that image to mock: "Other players take off their shirts to show off their muscles and biceps, our players take off their shirts to show off their tattoos." A sarcastic statement from Chinese fans about the future that they consider to be uncertain for their country's football.

The defeat against U22 Vietnam made many Chinese fans angry. Photo: VTC

Ton Weibo:

1. “In the first 20 minutes of the match, I saw the home team play coherently, confidently hold the ball and make accurate passes. I had great confidence and hope in the future of Vietnamese football. It was not until player number 9 scored that I realized the team in white was not China.”

2. “Just 0 - 2?”

3. “Even though I play badly, my salary is still high.What's up?"

4. "Actually, it's normal because Vietnamese football has made great progress in the past year."

5. “Everyone sit down, this is normal.

> Vietnam has recently started to get stronger, in youth tournaments it seems to be better than China".

6. “Who will lose next?

> Probably Myanmar”.

7. “To be honest, the fullback played worse than the fullback on my school's football team, sad and regrettable.”

8. “No team can lose to China anymore, no team...”.

9. “Our country's performance is stable. (meaning we keep losing)”

10. “Next could be China 0-1 Brunei, or China 0-1 East Timor. In short, expect us to improve from 0-2 to 0-1.”

11. “Tonight is enough, the men's basketball team lost, the men's soccer team also lost. In the end, the only hope left is the women's basketball team, the women's volleyball team and the women's soccer team.”

On the top sports site sinasport:

1. "Our players today showed their learning spirit, dared to play, and only lost by 2 goals to the Vietnamese giants. If we continue to show this spirit, I believe that in less than 10 years we will catch up with the Vietnamese giants."

2. "Although we lost, but only losing to Vietnam by 2 goals is enough to give us hope. I believe that in a few hundred years or a few thousand years we will catch up with our opponents."

3. "This young team really tried hard, facing a strong opponent but only conceded a goal in the 18th minute. The second half adjustment was clearly effective. Although we conceded another goal in the 57th minute, at least we made the Vietnamese goalkeeper save the goal twice. There is hope for the upcoming U23 Asia."

4. "I said it, for several years now Vietnam has been approaching the top 4 in Asia, losing to them is normal."

5. “Don't curse the players anymore, they tried their best, the opponent was too strong, there was no way.”

It can be seen that although football is not the most popular sport in China, the fact that from a population of nearly 1 billion people, it is impossible to choose a team capable of defeating a small team next to it really makes the fans of this country feel frustrated and not have much hope for the goals that President Xi once hoped for and tried his best to change.