Soccer players on China’s national team should remove any existing tattoos and are “strictly prohibited” from getting any new ones, the Chinese General Administration of Sport has said.
The sport has found itself in the crosshairs of the Chinese Communist Party’s purity drive, and players on the national soccer team routinely cover their arms with long sleeves or bandages to hide their tattoos.
However, the agency said in a statement on Tuesday that players on the national team “are strictly prohibited from having new tattoos.”
Photo: AFP
“Those who have tattoos are advised to have them removed,” the statement said. “In special circumstances, the tattoos must be covered during training and competition, with the consent of the rest of the team.”
The under-20 national teams and those even younger were “strictly prohibited” from recruiting anyone with tattoos, it said.
Not all fans appeared to be behind the new rules.
“Are we choosing a good football player or a saint?” one fan asked on social media.
“Shall we just say outright that only the party members could play football?” another asked.
Body ink is traditionally frowned upon in China, but it is increasingly popular among young adults, even as authorities make plain their disdain for it.
The Chinese Football Association has ordered players in the national team to cover tattoos in recent years, and packed young players off to military camps for drills and Marxist-style “thought education.”
That has prompted complaints from fans that it is thinking more about politics than sport.
Last year, a women’s university match was eventually called off after players were told they were not allowed to have dyed hair.
Chinese President Xi Jinping wants China to host and even win the FIFA World Cup one day.
However, they are fifth of six teams in their qualifying group for next year’s World Cup, with only the top two guaranteed to qualify.
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