In the World Cup Asian Qualifier Round of 12, the Chinese men's football team and Japan, Australia and other teams are divided into Group B. In terms of strength, the Japanese team can be called the first qualifying hot, and even if the national football team coached by Li Tie has multiple naturalized internationals, the actual goal is only to compete for the third place in the group.
How big is the gap between Chinese and Japanese football? Like Wu Lei, who returned from staying in the Ocean, he is already a well-deserved thigh of the national football team, but the Chinese men's football team is the only one who stays in the ocean. According to the statistics of the "Transfer Market Network", the number of Japanese players in Europe in 2021 has reached 451, of which the number of Japanese players in the German league is the largest, which is as high as 250.
The gap between Chinese and Japanese football today can be described as a gap, but 20 years ago, the gap was not so big. The national youth team, coached by Shen Xiangfu, was once known as the "super platinum generation", when it participated in the 2000 Asian Youth Championship and defeated the South Korean team 1:0, and eventually won the third place. At the 2001 World Youth Championships, the national youth team led by Qu Bo, Xu Liang and Dewey reached the round of 16 with the third place in the group, and finally lost 1-2 to the final champion Argentina.
In a recent interview, Shen Xiangfu, who is currently the youth director of the deep football club, recalled the history of playing against japan's national youth. At that time, the first time the team was played, Shen Xiangfu thought that the Chinese players were in better physical condition and slighted the Japanese players: they would still play football with their small body? As a result, after the game began, the Chinese players could not touch the ball at all, and lost 0-2!
Shen Xiangfu said that he felt very humiliated. After the game, Shen Xiangfu told the Japanese coach that Japanese football was improving and improving. As a result, people replied, "As you can see, it is like this." The pride of his peers made Shen Xiangfu very embarrassed, and if there was a crack in the ground, he was eager to quickly drill into it. Later, in the Asian Youth Championship, China's national youth team lost 0-2 to Japan.
In the 2001 Future Cup, the national youth team defeated the Argentine team composed of players from the second team to gain fame, and the Japanese team lost to Brazil. Shen Xiangfu said that the Japanese team looked at the Chinese team at that time instead of looking down from above, but began to look down. When they played again a few months later, China's national youth team defeated Japan 1-0. From defeat to victory, the team led by Shen Xiangfu completed the counterattack.
Recalling this history, Shen Xiangfu said that if our youth training is on the right path, the gap between us and Japan and South Korea can be narrowed. At present, Shenzu and Chongqing Furen Middle School have cooperated to build an elite team for the U10-U13 age group, and Shen Xiangfu, as the youth training director of The Deepfoot Club, has carried out youth training work in Chongqing to explore the combination of sports and education.
In the process of selecting talents, Shen Xiangfu found that there is a major problem in Chinese football, that is, there are too few players with characteristics, one is that there are fewer players with fast speed, and the other is that there are fewer left-footed players. If you want to change the current situation of China's weak youth training, you also need professionals like Shen Xiangfu and clubs like Shenzu to invest more and study more.