China is aware of the widening gap between South Korea and Japan in football.
China's Sohu Dotcom was frustrated by the reality of Chinese soccer when it analyzed the list of candidates for the third Asian qualifying round for the 2026 FIFA World Cup in North Korea and the U.S. announced by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) on the 26th.
The media interpreted that the fact that there is only one Chinese player out of a total of 46 candidates shows the current level of Chinese soccer. Sohu said 'If you look at the list of candidates, the gap between the Chinese national team and Korea and Japan is clear. In Japan, a total of four players were nominated, and in Korea, as many as five players were included in the list, while in China, only one Jang Sung-long was named. Through this, we realize that Chinese soccer is showing an increasingly wide gap with the first-class level in Asia.
Jang Sung-long, who has saved China's pride even a little, is unlikely to be selected as the best-Eleven. Sohu Dotcom also added '13 defenders were included in the list of candidates. If a 4-4-2 formation is finally adopted, Jang will have to undergo considerable competition to be selected as the final four defenders out of the 13 competitors.
Finally, Sohu said 'When it comes to the results of the third round of World Cup qualifiers, Chinese football now has no hope without sweeping reforms. Everyone from top to bottom, from inside to outside must make a decision, otherwise the gap with other strong teams in Asia will inevitably widen further in the future,' he said, pointing to China's disastrous reality.
The reason why Jang Sung-lung was nominated as a best-Eleven candidate was, of course, that China's performance in the third qualifying round was so disappointing. Chinese soccer figured out how disastrous China's reality was in the third qualifying round.
China wouldn't have expected to bring the ticket to the World Cup finals right away, but it wouldn't have thought it would not make it to the fourth qualifying round. China didn't even have the ability to go to the fourth qualifying round. China would have had confidence that it was the strongest except for Asia's strongest teams, South Korea, Japan, and Iran, but this result proved that such confidence was absurd.
It is important for China to close the gap while looking ahead, but it must also make efforts not to be chased. In recent years, Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam have shown steady growth, while China has remained in place and lost its international competitiveness. As a result, it is on the verge of being pushed out of the top 100 in the FIFA rankings.
Feeling the need for change, China is expected to try to change generations through the upcoming East Asian Football Federation (EAFF) E-1 Championship (East Asian Cup). However, unless the structural problems of Chinese soccer with weak roots are solved, short-term changes are unlikely to close the gap with Asian powerhouses.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
