An embarrassment is in the cards for China today when it plays Brazil on the island of Cheju in South Korea.
The betting is on how many goals the Brazilians put past China, after an inept performance by the latter against Costa Rica, when it lost 2-0 in its first ever World Cup match.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Ominously for China, it could start the match today at Seogwipo Stadium without its most experienced players, defenders Fan Zhiyi and Sun Jihai, who have 170 caps between them and picked up injuries in the first game.
"We are afraid of a big defeat," said China Sports Daily reporter Xu Xiaoyu. "This is our first time in the World Cup, so we should bear in mind the history of Japan and South Korea, who have lost many times."
She said that China would learn from the experience of participating in the World Cup this time and said she was hopeful about China's chances against Brazil. "Maybe I'm dead, but everything is possible."
Xu said it had been "very important" for China to make it into the World Cup. "Every four years it has been a big dream for us, but we [China] always lost our chance. But this time we took it.
"Actually, though, we were lucky to get through this time because our qualification group was not very strong."
China topped Group 9, ahead of Indonesia, the Maldives and Cambodia.
Xu said China kickstarted its soccer development program in the 1980s when the game became popular and surfed a "hot sports wave."
She said soccer progressed from 1986 to 1994, when the first professional league was established. "Now, soccer is the No. 1 sport, followed by basketball. All the children play soccer."
China's women's team is one of the best in the world and Xu said this was because the game was developed in China around the same time as in other countries.
She said the government had backed the women's game from an early stage and promising players were encouraged from an early age.
The men's game lagged behind, she said, because it was 100 years behind the rest of the world. "We have only just started, we need more time to catch up."
Speaking of her job at the China Sports Daily, Xu said that she had studied chemical engineering and worked in a factory when the "hot sports wave" broke.
She said she had changed jobs because she wanted to do something different and the newspaper industry was also experiencing growth at this time.
She said around 30 percent of journalists in China were women and around 10 percent of them were sports journalists.
The China Sports Daily is an eight-page, six-issues-a-week paper that is owned by the government, but is financially independent.
Asked whether she was a government employee, Xu said, "No ... yes ... maybe ... I don't know. The government does not pay our money, but it did build the paper, so I don't know."
Asked about the politics of the paper and about government interference, Xu said, "I am just a reporter and my bosses will understand these questions, but I do not."
China's coach Bora Milutinovic said that his team's inexperience at the World Cup had cost them the match against Costa Rica.
"We were naive, just not experienced enough to play quickly," he said. "In the World Cup it is difficult to come back after conceding a goal, and we conceded two goals in four minutes.
"It is important to react quickly. When you play fast you do not have any problems."
Milutinovic said he was hoping for a good performance today in order to please China's traveling army of fans and also the public back home.
Estimates of the number of traveling fans have swung wildly from just under 7,000 for the match against Costa Rica, to over 30,000.
"Some say over 40,000, but I don't know. They come as organized groups and are often sent by the factories they work for," the Serbian-born Milutinovic said.
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