The tears came without warning.
Shui Qingxia, the coach of the Chinese women's football team who is in medical isolation, recently accepted an interview with CCTV news and burst into tears twice in more than 20 minutes. The first tearful moment came after a few routine questions at the beginning of the interview, and when the host mentioned that she herself had expressed her desire to become a Chinese women's football coach before the announcement of her appointment on November 18 last year, Shui Qingxia choked up tears and said, "After so many years of women's football work, from athletes to coaches... I think the feelings of women's football have always been rooted in my heart. If there is a chance... To give it a try. ”
For the audience, this moment is somewhat abrupt, but her feelings are not unforeseen. On the contrary, it took too long to pave the way. In five years, she has twice accompanied the Competition for the Manager of the Chinese Women's Football Team. For the first time, the manager was assigned to Jiangsu women's football coach Eyjolsson. Unbeknownst to the fact that Shui Qingxia was full of ambition, she went to the scene of the Yongchuan Women's Football Four Nations Tournament to observe the team members, and her hard work was finally wasted; Eyol Song was dismissed from class, and she lost to Jia Xiuquan in the second escort run. She refused the third escort run, as the outside world knows, this time the manager candidate has been set in zhao junzhe.
There is a saying in the Chinese football circle: there are two kinds of football in the world, one is football and the other is Chinese football. Similar to the strange so-called competition, she also experienced once in the Shanghai women's football team, that farce finally withdrew the competition materials with one candidate, and the other candidate's coaching certificate level was not enough, and she competed alone.
Today we want to tell the story of Shui Qingxia, the stories and moments that are too late or cannot be told in the interview, and at the same time, we also objectively talk about the clear or potential problems of this Chinese women's football team. The Chinese women's football team that was put on the line needed to take the initiative to change
In Shui Qingxia's coaching career, she has coached more than 300 games of all sizes. In our opinion, it is her knowledge of women's football players that laid the foundation for winning the Asian Cup.
Team member Lou Jiahui revealed that after losing the Olympic Games last year, she felt that her national team career was over, and even had the idea of retiring as a coach. But just when she was at her worst, Shui Qingxia called her and recruited her to join the team. Why is there such a call? This is because when Lou Jiahui was still in the national youth team, Shui Qingxia, as an assistant coach, had taken her for six years, so she was very aware of the ability of this player.
It is also based on this understanding that we can see a Chinese women's football team at the Asian Cup that is vastly different from last year's Olympic Games. As can be seen from several matches at this Asian Cup, although the "Mizushi style" has not yet been fully formed, it already has a basic frame and lines. The two more representative moments were the first equalizer goal in the semi-final with Japan, which was scored by Wu Chengshu after three consecutive passes on the side, and Xiao Yuyi's killer goal in the Korean final was to steal five feet from the back and pass it all on the ground.
Previously, the chinese women's football team and the men's football team played almost the same scene, and the ball always flew in the sky. For a team that obviously has strong offensive ability, even if the past tactics have made the players feel uncomfortable, at least they are more recognized and more adapted to the current tactical style.
This also leads to a problem – the biggest problem that the Chinese women's football team has exposed at the Asian Games: top-heavy. The attacking line is asian first-class, but there is a lack of good defenders. In March, the annual National Women's Football Championship will be held in Kunming, and Shui Qingxia should focus more on defender talent. By the time they regroup in May, the squad should change.
But don't get your hopes up, because that's how the staffing stocks have been in recent years. Shui Qingxia herself said, "We still have a few dishes to make." "It still sounds a little helpless.
With the current personnel situation, what can be done is to further strengthen the advantages. Although the women's attack line has already shown its power in this Asian Cup, it has not yet fully met the requirements of the manager, and the strongest women's football attack line has not yet been born, which is also worth our expectations.
It's been more than a week since the women's championship won, and when the passion fades, it helps people look at the championship more objectively.
One of the conventions of Chinese women's football, most new coaches always have a honeymoon period at the beginning of their tenure, I don't know if this can be regarded as "the luck of novices". Shui Qingxia's glory of leading the team to win the Asian Cup completely overshadowed other successes, but just looking through the historical records, you can see that her predecessors also did a good job when they first took office:
After Jia Xiuquan took over the Chinese women's football team in 2018, the team's first major event was the Jakarta Asian Games, when the team defeated the recognized Asian hegemon North Korea in the semi-finals and finally won the silver medal;
His last term was Bini, and the Frenchman's feat was to lead the team to the Rio Olympics under extremely difficult circumstances. At that time, six teams, including Australia, Japan, South Korea, North Korea, China and Vietnam, played a single round-robin tournament in Tokyo, Japan, and only two teams could qualify, while China's absolute strength was only above Vietnam...
It sounds like metaphysics, but there is also a scientific explanation: because of freshness. Opponents have not had enough time to understand the tactical play of the new coach.
Shui Qingxia took office in November last year, and since then she has launched intensive training at the Oriental Green Boat Base. It was only a little over two months from team formation to participation in the Asian Cup. In the past two or three years, due to the impact of the epidemic, there has been little contact between countries, until the Asian Cup, Japan, South Korea, Australia and other countries' understanding of China's women's football team is still in the period led by Jia Xiuquan. In the training of oriental green boats, the media did not expose too much, so the Asian Cup is equivalent to unveiling the veil for the first time, showing the technical and tactical level of the new women's football team.
With the asian cup winning, the team is now being beaten by their opponents. Others will surely study the Chinese women's football team as a sample in the laboratory, just as people once did with the Japanese women's football team after winning the 2011 World Cup.
Next, it is the East Asian Cup in July and the Asian Games in September, if the team itself does not take the initiative to change, it will be in a passive position. To be sure, there are no players in the team who are so strong that they can't defend even if they are thoroughly studied. This requires the team to strengthen the technical and tactical style.
At this Asian Cup, people saw the fighting spirit of the Chinese women's football team, which has become the most praised content of the game after the game, but we should not blindly worship the so-called spirit. The spirit is always based on sufficient ability, and without this attachment, the spirit loses its value. Relying too much on the power of the spirit will cause the team to neglect the improvement of technical and tactical capabilities. Fortunately, Shui Qingxia has a clear understanding of this.
Fair and just, with personality charm to convince people
A championship trophy can mask a lot of things, and it can amplify a lot of things.
What we see is the bright smiles of the women's football players against the backdrop of gold medals, but like almost all teams in the world, even all the masters of kings, this team has its own internal problems. Three women in a play, when thirty women together, the play is naturally indispensable. However, out of recognition and obedience to coach Shui Qingxia, some players are willing to suppress their emotions and dissatisfaction with each other. In other words, the players were inspired by her powerful charisma.
This charisma consists of two parts: her professionalism, and her fairness and impartiality as a person.
Professionalism has been proved by the Asian Cup champion, here to talk about her impartiality, do not underestimate this, it is difficult to cultivate on the soil of Chinese football. During her time coaching the Shanghai women's football team, there was an incident: in a reserve team game, a player of the Shanghai women's football team was yellow carded for a malicious foul, but she was obviously dissatisfied with the penalty, so she had words in her mouth. Shui Qingxia, who was watching the game from the sidelines, reminded in Shanghainese that it was indeed her fault first.
The player himself was in the first team, because the weight was not well controlled and was devolved, originally had some complaints, ate the yellow card and was told by the head coach, causing the mood to lose control, completely broke out on the way down the field, and cried and scolded at Shui Qingxia. Everyone witnessed this farce, and the opponent coaches and players also looked into the eyes, and they could make up for how much she lost face as a head coach.
The player later took the initiative to apologize to her, and Shui Qingxia did not pursue it, but asked her to think about her future. After the team imposed a routine fine, the matter ended here. Since then, the player has made up his mind, lost more than a dozen pounds a month, and his game status has immediately improved, so he can return to the first team. Later, when playing against such a strong team as Jiangsu in the league, Shui Qingxia gave her a chance to start regardless of her previous suspicions.
This kind of solipsism was originally only a basic requirement for coaches, but in Chinese teams, it can be regarded as a noble character.
She admits that she also has shortcomings
Shui Qingxia also has her own shortcomings, and she admitted in the interview that her temper has put more pressure on the team members. As a traditional Chinese coach, one of the characteristics of her past coaching career is that the way she likes a player is not to spoil her, but to give her the opportunity to exercise her, and often the more harsh the players she likes.
A good example is Xiao Yuyi, a player from Shantou, Guangdong Province, who scored the winning goal in the final against South Korea. As one of the members of the 95-96 team of the Shanghai women's football team, Xiao Yuyi was optimistic about Shui Qingxia from the beginning. At the National Women's Football Championship in Kunming in early 2016, the Shanghai women's football team played against Wuhan in the semi-finals, and she gave Xiao Yuyi, who had just joined the team, a chance to play as a center forward, but she played badly, and the passes of her teammates were repeatedly cut off, which meant constantly turning back for those midfielders.
Xiao Yuyi still remembers that game,
"I thought I was still very young at that time, and when I saw those old players so angry, I threw my shirt directly on the bench after I got off the field, and I was scared to death."
Although the game was won, Shui Qingxia was very angry and scolded Xiao Yuyi, and she cried on the spot. No one comforted her, and when she was finished crying, she silently packed up her gear and went back to her dormitory.
This year she was hidden in the snow for half a season, but then became the best newcomer in the Women's Super League in 2017.
An incident that happened a few years ago can intuitively restore some of the characteristics of Shui Qingxia's personality.
In 2019, The main muse of Shanghai women's football team underwent cruciate ligament surgery. Shui Qingxia personally contacted her to go to Beijing for rehabilitation, and greeted the Football Association, making sure that the player had the best rehabilitation conditions. This can show her attention and love for Mu Siwen, but a year later, when the players returned from recovery and returned to the training ground, they instinctively showed some "pity", which is the common sentiment of people, and in Shui Qingxia's view, since she recovered, she must show her full mental outlook. So, she coldly threw down the next sentence ,"If it doesn't work, go back."
She has said this many times, including this Asian Cup final. According to herself, she once pointed out to Tang Jiali and Wang Shuang during the competition, "Can you do it, if not, you will go down." She admits that such words "should be quite powerful." ”
But can you say she treats her players too harshly? However, that's how she came to be herself. Anyone who knows her well knows that she now has no meniscus on one knee — meniscus removal surgery after an injury, and a steel nail that stayed inside her for seven full years. She would talk to the people around her when she was chatting,
"You know wow? I used to play football and my feet hurt, but I kept running on the field. The coaches below all shouted at me, 'Ah Shui, you run less, take a break.' But I knew I couldn't stop, because once I stopped, I couldn't run anymore. ”
Shui Qingxia, a person who speaks in Shanghainese, is really "tough" (Note: strong), and there is a little-known story here.
At the end of 2016, she had been suffering from abdominal pain, went to the hospital to check it out and said she was going to operate. After the Spring Festival, the Shanghai women's football team went to Kunming for training. Because Shui Qingxia was still recovering, she was trained by an assistant coach. Some players started choking on the water because the manager was not there, and she was anxious as soon as she heard it on the phone. I'm about to play a tournament, what should I do if I don't play well? The National Women's Football Championship is one of the three major events of Chinese women's football, but in large and small competitions, she regards it more than her own life.
So, only 15 days after the operation, she went to the plateau. During that winter training, she swallowed painkillers every day to go to the training ground, and the players stood for two hours, and she also stood for two hours. Everyone asked her to sit down, and she said, "How can I sit?" The women's soccer team member recalled that except for not personally demonstrating as before, everything else was business as usual.
In that championship, Shanghai won the championship.
Today, Shui Qingxia sees the strength of her own year in players such as Wang Shanshan and Wang Shuang in the national team, which is what many Shanghai women's football players lack. When she was still the manager of the Shanghai women's football team, she often pointed out to everyone, "What you lack is this energy." ”
We believe that all the accolades and loyalties she has received in the national team now come from the hearts of the players, but it must also be seen that they all happened in a smooth situation. Let's suppose that when the team suffers a low point for a certain period of time – which is the inevitable law – who can guarantee that the players will continue to believe in Shui Qingxia and unswervingly follow her?
As a human nature, doubt is always there. Even if it is as great as Lippi, it still loses the hearts of the people in the final period of the national football team. When the results fluctuate, can her fierceness, even "inhumane", still make the players buy it? That's a problem.
The media should not create gods, and fans should put an end to the culture of the rice circle
Women's soccer is back on top of Asia and has attracted a lot of attention, which is a good thing. But for the media and fans, we should not mythologize the individual and promote the culture of the rice circle, which is the bottom line.
From the reports of most media on Shui Qingxia and the main team members after winning the championship, it can be seen that they are consciously or unconsciously setting off a large-scale "god-making" campaign, which has no benefit.
Tang Jiali played well in the Asian Cup, the limelight overshadowed Wang Shuang, and there is a tendency to become the number one star in the team. Among her praises, it is indispensable to add a stroke to play for Tottenham hot spots in the Premier League. But in fact, we can check the data of her landing in the Premier League for half a year, and we can see that she has made a total of six appearances in the league, only one start, and what has been hyped up by the domestic media is her performance in the cup match, but she has only scored one goal. In fact, she herself admitted that because of the injury, this stay in the ocean has not been successful until now.
It is not intended to belittle the players, but to show that true fans will accept the true value of the players they admire. In China, the groups of male and female soccer fans are very different. After the Chinese women's football team won the championship, Wang Feng, president of the Shanghai Women's Football Support Association, told us that the group of women's football fans is gradually becoming a circle, which is reflected in the fact that they only pay attention to their favorite players.
He showed reporters several screenshots of Wang Shuang's fan base saying during the game and after the game. In the final, Wang Shuang came on the court with an injury, although it played a certain role in the opponent, but the overall performance was average. In order to open up the situation when 0-2 was behind, it was normal for the coach to replace Wang Shuang with fresh blood, but the fan group fried the pot, "Actually replaced Wang Shuang, Shui Qingxia surrendered, right?" Others announced, "It's over, let's wash and sleep!" ”
Since then, even the champion of the Chinese women's football team has not aroused high enthusiasm among these fans.
He also remembered a women's football match at the Tazihu Sports Center in Wuhan one year, because the game was played at night, and some girls in the stands wore luminous headbands on their heads, dotted with a few shining little stars. He couldn't help but ask one of them, "Are you going to come to the game or the concert?" During the match, the female fans in the stands shouted "Wang Shuang Wang Shuang, the world is unparalleled", but they could not even understand the basic offside.
"I gave the example of Wang Shuang's fans, which has nothing to do with the players themselves. From my private contacts with Wang Shuang, I felt that she was a very pure player and never managed her own personality. It's not the players' fault, and they are helpless a lot of the time, but that's the way it is in the online environment. ”
Wang Xiaoxue, who played all five games in the Asian Cup and blocked the shots of South Korean players with her chest in the final, was a victim of the Internet storm at last year's Olympic Games, and many bad words still remain in her comments on Weibo. After the Asian Cup, she quickly rose to the height of a national hero. What will happen to them after the next big game?
"This environment is abnormal and unhealthy," Wang Feng told the Morning News reporter, lamenting when Wang Shuang joined Paris Saint-Germain, where the same fans supported the men's and women's football teams. That is to say, they watch the men's football team and then look at the women's football team, because they support the whole Grand Paris Club. "But here, most of the so-called women's football fans look at faces, for example, they will watch women's football games because of Zhao Lina, and when they find out that Zhao Lina is not playing, they immediately stop watching."
And some fans talk about seniority, sell women's football signature jerseys in exchange for relationships, and even spend money in exchange for meeting women's football players (the players themselves do not know), which can be said to be very circled. In Wang Feng's view, this released a dangerous signal. "What women's football needs is real fans," he said, not holding out much hope for the attention that has risen after the Chinese women's football team won the Asian Cup, "how long can it last?" The National Women's Championships are about to start in March, and we can see how many people will pay attention to the game. ”