At the Beijing Winter Olympics, a large number of naturalized athletes in China attracted attention. In addition to Gu Ailing and Zhu Yi, who are familiar and loved by everyone, the ice hockey team has a large number of naturalized athletes. In the 23-man roster of the Chinese women's ice hockey team, 13 are naturalized players, and the men's ice hockey team has 25 players, reaching 15 naturalized players. The road traveled by China's naturalized foreign athletes is worth recalling and thinking about.
As early as 1994, He Zhili changed her nationality, represented Japan in the Asian Games, and defeated Deng Yaping to win the championship. At that time, the media denounced He Zhili for forgetting to betray the country. However, after this, athletes in table tennis, badminton, gymnastics, weightlifting and other advantageous sports have also been naturalized to other countries to represent other countries, and the naturalization of Chinese athletes has become a norm.
Athletes who are partially foreign nationals
Time shifts to 2008, the Beijing Olympics. In the face of a large number of Chinese "overseas legions" representing foreign countries, people shouted the slogan of "welcome home", and we became more tolerant and identified with naturalized athletes.
But during this period, only Chinese athletes were naturalized to foreign countries, and no athletes from other countries were naturalized to China.
In July 2011, NetEase Sports published "Should China Naturalize Foreign Players" to open a discussion on China's naturalized foreign athletes, but the reaction at that time was not large and did not attract universal attention. In the same period, Tencent Sports published articles such as "Whether China Can Naturalize High-Level Players" and Huaao Star Network published articles such as "Chinese Football Naturalized Players Can Actually Be Discussed", which also did not attract attention.
In 2013, the Journal of Tianjin University of Physical Education published an article by Lin Minwang of Xiamen University entitled "Policy Choices for Athlete Naturalization: The Dual Consideration of Economic Rationality and Nationalism", which believes that as the relationship between sports and globalization becomes more and more intimate, athlete naturalization has become the main manifestation of sports globalization, and this trend will become more obvious in the future sports world. At the same time, the development of sports globalization has also promoted the further strengthening of sports nationalism. Under the dual consideration of economic rationality and nationalism, the naturalization of athletes is a difficult problem for the decision-makers of sports authorities.
Since this time, scholars have begun to call for the naturalization of foreign athletes, but in this period, it mainly refers to the indisputable Chinese men's football team, hoping to achieve the purpose of "rushing out of Asia" through naturalized foreign players.
However, during this period, the public did not agree with naturalization, and in 2014, Xinhua Daily used the headline "Naturalization of "Foreign Aid" is not a shortcut to the south" when discussing the naturalization of foreign men's basketball players in South Korea.
In 2015, Wan Amper, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, put forward the proposal that "to revitalize Chinese football, it is necessary to break through the forbidden area of naturalized players and amend the Nationality Law to vigorously introduce high-level naturalized players", and the issue of naturalized players was raised for the first time on a formal occasion.
At the end of 2018, the Summary Conference of the Chinese Professional League was held in Shanghai, and Du Zhaocai, then Secretary of the Party Committee of the Chinese Football Association, said that the naturalization of outstanding foreign players would be actively promoted in the future, and that naturalized athletes were an important practice for the implementation of the "Overall Plan for The Reform of Chinese Football", which marked the first time that the official had a positive attitude towards the naturalization of football players.
In January 2019, Beijing Guoan Club officially announced that Hou Yongyong, a Norwegian Chinese, joined as a Chinese national, becoming China's first naturalized player.
In August 2019, Axon (formerly known as Elkeson de Oliveira Cardoso, born in Brazil) completed the relevant procedures such as the change of nationality and was selected for the Chinese men's national football team, becoming the first naturalized player in China without pedigree.
As of December 2020, the mainland has completed the legal procedures for naturalization and naturalization of 10 foreign players, namely Exxon, Jiang Guangtai, Gaolat, Alan, Fei Ernando, Luo Guofu and Xiao Tao of Guangzhou Evergrande Taobao Club, Li Ke and Hou Yongyong of Beijing Guoan Club, and Delgado of Shandong Luneng Taishan Club, of which 7 naturalized players are all post-90s. The reason why there are so many naturalized football players is because at the same time, in places that have not been reported by the media, we have naturalized a large number of athletes in ice and snow sports. It can be said that football borrows the light of the Winter Olympics.
The two major obstacles to the naturalization of foreign athletes are the relevant provisions of the Nationality Law and nationalist sentiment. However, at the Beijing Winter Olympics, our recognition of athletes such as Gu Ailing and Ye Jinguang shows that their competitive sports strength and excellent sportsmanship have been recognized by the Chinese people, and on the other hand, it shows that the Chinese people are more confident and more open-minded.
In the future, naturalized athletes will become the norm, and everyone will look at it more normally. I hope that the men's football team can also seize the opportunity and not let people down again.