Chinese soccer fans and media rounded on the national team yesterday after they experienced fresh humiliation in a 7-0 thrashing to rivals Japan in their opening Group C match in the third phase of Asian qualifying for the 2026 World Cup.
The humiliation in Saitama on Thursday against Asia’s top-ranked team was China’s worst defeat in World Cup qualifying and only a goal short of their record 8-0 loss to Brazil in 2012.
Chinese President Xi Jinping once said he wanted China to host and even win the World Cup one day, but that ambition looked further away than ever after a chastening evening at Saitama Stadium.
Photo: EPA-EFE
China had only squeezed into the decisive third round of qualifying for the 2026 World Cup thanks to a superior head-to-head record over Thailand.
They are still alive in the group despite the desperate start, but Oriental Sports Daily said it was China’s heaviest World Cup qualifying defeat.
“When the taste of bitterness reaches its extreme, all that is left is numbness,” it said.
Photo: Reuters
The paper in Shanghai said that Chinese soccer had hit “rock-bottom” and called it a “disastrous defeat.”
It partly pointed the finger at China’s Croatian boss Branko Ivankovic, calling his “incompetence... a contributing factor to this crushing defeat.”
Ivankovic, who guided Oman to a shock 1-0 win over Japan in their first game of the final round of qualifiers for Qatar 2022, but had no hope of repeating the feat as the world number 24 hosts ran riot at Saitama Stadium, said in comments published by Xinhua news agency: “It was a tough match, and as a coach, this was the most difficult night for me.”
The hammering in Saitama was hotly discussed on Chinese social media platform Weibo, with the hashtag “National team loses to Japan 0-7” viewed 480 million times as of Friday morning.
“We still don’t know what the Japanese goalkeeper looks like after a 90-minute game,” one user said.
Another went as far as to call for the team to be “disbanded.”
“There is no point in spending the most money on this useless project,” the user added.
Writing on Weibo, former national team player Fan Zhiyi — who featured at the 2002 World Cup — said: “When there’s a gap in ability and you lose, it’s acceptable. What’s hard for football fans to accept is losing like this.”
“If it weren’t far from here, I would have really jumped into the Huangpu River,” Fan said, referring to Shanghai’s main waterway, in a widely circulated video.
China qualified for the World Cup only once in 2002, when they lost all three of their matches by a combined nine goals in the tournament co-hosted by Japan and South Korea.
Fans and the nation’s leaders have long bemoaned the team’s failure to return to the global showpiece.
Ivankovic’s predecessor Aleksandar Jankovic was sacked in February after failing to guide China into the knockout stage of the Asian Cup in Qatar.
Fans have long blamed corruption in China’s soccer governance for the team’s underperformance.
A string of senior officials in the Chinese Football Association have been jailed this year for taking bribes, including former vice president Li Yuyi, Chinese state media reported last month.
China will attempt to get their campaign back on track when they host Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
Elsewhere in Group C, Australia fell to a shock 1-0 loss to Bahrain at home on Thursday. Despite losing all six previous games against Australia, Bahrain won thanks to an own goal from Harry Souttar with a minute remaining on the Gold Coast.
Abdulla Al-Khalasi’s cross from the left side of the area hit the defender and flew past goalkeeper Mat Ryan.
Australia dominated the game, but were reduced to 10 players when Kusini Yengi was red-carded after 77 minutes for a reckless tackle.
Bahrain are second in the group behind Japan.
Elsewhere in the competition, South Korea drew 0-0 with Palestine in their opening match of Group B.
South Korea coach Hong Myung-bo said he understood why fans booed him before, during and after his team’s 0-0 draw with Palestine in their opening match of Group B.
Thursday’s match was Hong’s first in charge since he replaced Jurgen Klinsmann as coach in early July and the unpopularity of that decision was clear when he was jeered by a crowd of 60,000 at Seoul’s World Cup Stadium before kickoff.
The boos continued every time Hong was shown on the big screen as the South Korea team, captained by Son Heung-min, failed to break down the Palestinians and were perhaps fortunate not to have conceded a goal.
“I understand where the fans come from. This is something I will have to endure going forward,” Hong said of the jeering, Yonhap New Agency reported.
South Korea have qualified for the last 10 editions of the World Cup finals and many fans had been hoping for the appointment of a new foreign coach of the caliber of Guus Hiddink, who led the Taeguk Warriors to the semi-finals in 2002.
Hong, the captain of that 2002 team and one of the standout players of the whole tournament, still has time to turn the qualifying campaign around, starting with the second Group B fixture against Oman in Muscat on Tuesday.
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