Recent articles on the history of Chinese football have been focused on the introduction of classic competitions in the past, and the players have written a little less. Today I would like to talk to you about the talented goalkeeper of the Guangdong team in the 1980s, and also the national gate spanning the three periods of Su Yongshun, Zeng Xuelin and Gao Fengwen, Yang Ning.
Yang Ning was born in 1962 to a sports family in Meixian County, Guangdong Province. Yang Ning's father, Yang Youbiao, was a player in the local strong people's football team in Meixian County in his early years, and after retiring, he worked as a football coach in Meixian, Yang Ning's mother was once a member of the Xinjiang women's volleyball team, and after retiring, he worked as a teacher in a local middle school in Meixian County. Yang Ning also has an older brother named Yang Xuan, who has served as a goalkeeper in the Guangbu football team and the Sichuan team.
His parents are athletes, and Yang Ning's athletic talent has also been displayed at a very young age. In 1973, at the age of 11, Yang Ning was selected by Xian Dixiong, the coach of the Guangdong Football Junior Team, and brought him back from Meixian to the Ershatou Sports Training Base in Guangzhou.
In 1978, the 16-year-old Yang Ning was favored by Su Yongshun and transferred him to the Guangdong first team. In the first year of entering the team, Yang Ning, who was only 17 years old, began to represent Guangdong as the starting goalkeeper in the National Football League. In 1979, Guangdong won the first national football league championship in the history of the team, and in the same year, the Guangdong team won the third place in the Four Games, as the goalkeeper Yang Ning was indispensable, he also together with Rong Zhixing, He Jia, Gu Guangming, Cai Jinbiao, Chen Xirong, Ou Weiting, Ye Xiquan, Du Qingen, Xie Zhiguang, He Jinlun, Wu Zhiying, Chen Weihao was named "National Football Athlete".
Remarks: This national athlete title was a very high honor for domestic athletes at that time, and Yang Ning was the only goalkeeper of the Guangdong team to receive this title, which should indicate that he played the main force in the team at that time, and Yang Fusheng was already a substitute.
However, what really made Yang Ning famous in domestic football was the two foreign games in 1980. The first was a friendly match between Guangdong and the visiting West German Hamburg team during the interval between participating in the Provincial Hong Kong Cup at the beginning of the year. In the case of not being optimistic before the game, Guangdong team finally drew 3-3 with Hamburg. In this classic game of southern football, Yang Ning faced the Hamburg attacking line led by Kevin Keegan, and resisted highly, defusing the dangerous situation again and again. Although the Guangdong team also conceded three goals, it was basically caused by the leakage of people in the back line, and it had little to do with Yang Ning itself.
In the Guangzhou International Football Friendship Invitational Tournament held in Guangzhou in June of the same year, Guangdong played a 90-minute match against the West German youth team coached by Vogts. This West German youth team has Litbarsky, Worrell, Schachneider and other players, the strength is very strong, and finally Guangdong team was scored by Schitz Schneider because of an offside mistake before the final game, and Guangdong lost the game 0-1. However, Yang Ning's performance in the previous eighty minutes was perfect, and he repeatedly saved the opponent's must-score, which greatly amazed the Guangzhou fans at the scene.
In July 1980, former Guangdong coach Su Yongshun officially became the new national football coach. Su Yongshun's first training camp at the helm of the national football team recruited The 18-year-old Yang Ning was recruited into the team, although in the subsequent seventh Asian Cup, Yang Ning did not follow the national football team to Kuwait. However, at the end of the year, when the national football team officially announced the list of personnel participating in the 1982 World Cup Sub-Regional Qualifiers, Yang Ning's name was prominently listed, and also returned to Rong Zhixing, who had previously been abandoned by Nian Weisi.
Of course, in this world preliminary tournament process, the main goalkeeper of the national football team has always been Li Fusheng of the Bayi team. Yang Ning, 18, has been sitting on the bench.
I have seen the views of many fans before, thinking that when Su Yongshun was the coach of the national team, the biggest mistake was not to recruit the young Yang Ning into the national team prematurely and let him sit on the bench, resulting in a gradual decline in Yang Ning's state behind.
To be honest, this statement is biased. Because Su Yongshun served as the head coach of the national team for a total of two years. He recruited Yang Ning into the national team, in fact, it was to cultivate and train new people. In the World Preliminary Tournament such a field, as the first goalkeeper of the national football team for many years, Li Fusheng, unless there is an injury, it is estimated that no one will dare to replace it easily, in fact, now, the national football team lost 0-1 away to Kuwait in that key battle, Li Fusheng has a certain responsibility for that goal.
There is also a kind of remark about Su Yongshun's recruitment of Yang Ning to the national team, which is nepotism. However, when Su Yongshun left office, Zeng Xuelin also frequently recruited Yang Ning into the national team at the beginning stage, which can show that Yang Ning really has considerable strength.
In April 1983, Zeng Xuelin was officially appointed as the new head coach of the national football team. In this year's national football competition, Zeng Xuelin has actually begun to train Yang Ning to prepare to replace Li Fusheng as the first goalkeeper of the national football team. Starting from the Great Wall Cup in the middle of the year, Yang Ning gradually began to alternate with Li Fusheng as the starter, and by the merlion cup at the end of the year, Yang Ning was already the first starter.
In the Asian Cup qualifiers in September 1984, Yang Ning played all four starts and played the whole game, helping the national football team to win all four games and not concede a goal, and advanced to the final round of the Asian Cup.
At the eighth Asian Cup held in Singapore at the end of the same year, the national football team lost 0-2 in the first game against Iran. Many people believe that it is precisely because of this game that Yang Ning lost the trust of Zeng Xuelin. In fact, the national football team is not in a bad state in this game, and many players such as Zuo Shusheng and Zhao Dayu are not in the state. On the contrary, Yang Ning tried to save the goal many times in the first half of the game.
More importantly, in the next match against the host Singapore, it was still Yang Ning who played the starting goalkeeper for the national football team, and finally the national football team won the first win of the group stage of the Asian Cup 2-0.
However, something strange came, after this game, Lu Jianren from beijing began to serve as the starting goalkeeper of the national football team, and continued until the end of this Asian Cup.
After the end of the Asian Cup, Yang Ning also bid farewell to the national team during the Zeng Xuelin period.
So the question is, if it is because Yang Ning did not perform well in the game against Iran, why should he continue to play in the second game against Singapore? After winning the Singapore match, what happened to Yang Ning in the national team?
No one knows.
By the time Yang Ning was selected for the national team again, it was the beginning of 1987. Gao Fengwen, who has just taken over as the manager of the national team, recruited Yang Ning into the team in his first national team training list, and another goalkeeper who entered Gao Jiajun at the same time will be Zhang Huikang from Shanghai. In the early days of Gao Fengwen's command, Yang Ning and Zhang Huikang started from the brazilian training to the first round of the Great Wall Cup and the Asian qualifiers of the Olympic Games, and the two basically took turns to play. However, when the contradictions between Li Huajun, Qin Guorong, Li Hui and Yang Ning and Gao Fengwen finally broke out, Yang Ning completely lost the starting position of the national team. Li Huajun was even directly cleared out of the national team and replaced by Wu Yuhua Xingye urgently.
At the end of 1987, the Sixth National Games was held in Guangzhou, and Yang Ning, who had already retreated at this time, found Yue Yongrong, the head coach of the Guangdong team, to discuss and let Kong Guoxian, who had recently been in the limelight, play the main force. And Kong Guoxian's performance did not disappoint, and in the end, he conceded only one goal in five games to help Guangdong win gold at the Six Games, and he himself was also awarded the best goalkeeper.
In 1988, at the age of 26, Yang Ning officially retired from the army and emigrated overseas.
In fact, Yang Ning's ability and talent in goalkeeping should not be too questionable, otherwise he would not have recruited three national football coaches into the national team in succession. So, why is it always difficult for Yang Ning to sit in the main position in the national team?
Personally, I think that as a goalkeeper, Yang Ning's unstable play on the field may be one of the most important reasons, a bit similar to the problem of Wang Dalei today, crazy can save any ball, but when it is in the downturn, it dares to lose any ball.
Finally, leaving a question for everyone to discuss together, it is purely whimsical. If it is said that in the 1982 World Preliminary Tournament, Su Yongshun used Yang Ning to replace Li Fusheng as the main goalkeeper of the national football team, whether the national football team is likely to qualify, welcome to leave a message in the comment area to discuss.