From 8,000 feet to only 6 people going to Bangkok, Chinese football has become an online spittoon
The journey of the Chinese men's football team to impact the 2026 World Cup in the United States, Canada and Mexico has officially begun.
Tonight, they will face Thailand away at the Rajamangala Stadium in Bangkok, and based on the current group situation, the strongest South Korean team in the group is almost unshakable, and if they want to ensure qualification, the two games with the Thai team will become a life-and-death battle to determine whether the Chinese team qualifies or not, so the key and importance of this game is absolutely undoubted.
The second stage of the national football world preliminaries
In the face of such an important competition, the official reporters who went to Thailand from China to cover the competition this time were only three text reporters and three photojournalists, and Xinhua News Agency and CCTV only sent local reporters in Thailand to cover and report.
Even the pre-match press conference did not have a Chinese translation, except for captain Wu Xi's speech that needed to be translated into English, Jankovic's speech and questions omitted the Chinese translation link.
Jankovic (second from left) and Wu Xi (second from right) attend the pre-match press conference.
Such a bleak scene is really shocking.
After all, at the Hangzhou Asian Games in September, although the men's national football team defeated South Korea in the quarterfinals, it was still quite popular and sought after by local fans overall. Now that only two months have passed, why is it suddenly so bleak?
But as long as you pay a little attention to the national football team, you will find that all this is actually a foreshadowing.
After the wave of "Jinyuan football" receded, Chinese football has suffered various blows repeatedly, and this season it has been a mess of chicken feathers because of the strong anti-corruption within the Football Association.
The departure of big-name foreign aids, the lack of domestic players, the concentrated outbreak of referee problems, and the retreat of many clubs... This has also led to repeated declines in the level of the league, especially in terms of ratings.
Chinese Super League
Although the average attendance of the Chinese Super League in the 2023 season is close to 20,000, there is still a huge gap of 20% compared with 2015-2019;
It is clear that the brand value of Chinese football is constantly falling.
At a meeting of professional league clubs earlier this year, the preparatory team of the Chinese Football Federation announced that Ping An would pay 100 million yuan for the naming of the 2023 Chinese Super League season – a full 50% less than the previous five seasons.
According to senior media reports, even so, whether the naming rights of the Chinese Super League next season will be settled and what the specific number will be is still unknown.
There are also broadcast rights fees for the Super League.
Previously, the sports Olympic power had offered a sky-high price of 150 million yuan per year for the broadcast rights of the Chinese Super League, but in the past two seasons, the copyright fee has fallen to the level of 10 million yuan, and even the distribution of the league copyright next season is still undecided.
But Chinese football in the past was obviously not like this.
The YOYO physical test of the Haigeng base became a household name with the reports of reporters that year
Looking back on the past, although Chinese football was ridiculed, it is still the out-and-out number one IP of domestic sports, and the popularity of the league has given birth to countless football reporters, and "Eight Thousand Feet to Haigeng" has become the most famous joke in the media circle.
At that time, Haigeng was overcrowded, and reporters walked around and wrote casually, and the two or three sentences casually said by players and coaches, as well as the bits and pieces of their daily life, could not become hot news everywhere.
By 2002, Li Xiang, a top student at Peking University, was often able to get exclusive insider news because of his deep friendship with the Chinese men's football team and head coach Mi Lu, which also led to the "Sports Weekly" to poach millions of dollars.
In today's new media era, the rise and fall of an industry is also easy to perceive through the attention and traffic it receives.
In the past, the media was willing to devote the most elite reporters to the news war of Chinese football, which in itself was an affirmation of the value of Chinese football.
But what about today?
Mi Lu and Li Xiang (right) attend an event together
Li Xiang gradually stopped making a noise after the sports newspaper and LeTV Sports tossed and turned; Huang Jianxiang and other well-known commentators left CCTV; Xu Yong turned around and started a club after claiming that he was abandoned by Chinese football; Li Chengpeng, Yan Qiang, and others faded out of the column football commentators and focused on traveling in the business sea; Dong Lu personally went into battle to start youth training...
Just like the innumerable A-A stars, there are now a few well-known domestic players, and the once dominant football fame, now only the "Real Ma Dexing" and the rising star Luo Ming are sticking to the position of reporters in Chinese football.
The Chinese Football Association announced its financial report for recent years at the Football Congress on October 16, and according to the report, the total debt of the Football Association in 2022 will reach 1.2 billion yuan, an increase of 700 million yuan from four years ago.
This data is particularly dazzling in the current context of the Football Association's anti-corruption and anti-corruption.
At the same time, in a corner where no one was paying attention, news media reported that the national football team went to Thailand this time, taking economy class and staying in a three-star hotel for 300 a night.
In the past, the days when the special plane and the whole hotel were full of flowers, it seemed that they were still in front of me, but they saw him rise upstairs and see him collapse, just like a dream of Nanke.
Only a small number of fans greeted the arrival of the national football team at Bangkok Airport in this World Preliminary Tournament
But it is not entirely accurate to say that the national football team is completely unpopular today, after all, after the evolution of the past 20 years, Chinese football has gradually found its position in the era of self-media - an online spittoon, all the self-media can come and spit out two mouthfuls if they have nothing to do, the spectators have gained happiness, the self-media has gained traffic, and Chinese football can at least continue to gain attention, and everyone is very satisfied.
But at this point, who is Chinese football going to blame?
On June 16 this year, the Chinese men's football team defeated Myanmar 4-0 in a friendly match with a crowd of 27,651 people, but on June 20, the Chinese men's football team beat Palestine 2-0 in a friendly match, the number of spectators plummeted to 16,151.
On September 9, the number of spectators climbed to 26,138 again in the friendly match between the Chinese men's football team and Malaysia, but three days later, the Chinese men's football team lost to Syria, and the number of spectators not only dropped to 12,367, but also collectively cheered for Syria.
In the friendly match on October 10, the Chinese men's football team defeated Vietnam 2-0, but the audience was only 9219, and only two domestic reporters attended the press conference after the game.
On October 16, the last warm-up game before the World Preliminary Tournament of the Chinese men's football team disappointingly lost to Uzbekistan, and the number of spectators - 12,868.
Freezing three feet, not a day's cold.
Distribution of World Cup places in the United States, Canada and Mexico
In this World Cup qualifiers, although the Asian region has won a total of 8.5 places due to the large expansion, almost all domestic fans and media people are still not optimistic about the Chinese men's football team, and even most people believe that it is difficult for the current national football team to enter the top 18.
But not many people seem to care.
If you lose the quality of the league, you lose the audience, and if you lose the audience, you lose the newsworthiness.
The winter of China's football industry is not coming, but already coming.