Get ready for the Chinese Empire

[MR.ESTESNAII]

Ma sare Zamine football dava Darim, chiniha intori kharj mikonan:


http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/15/footba...&iref=obinsite

[PersianLegion]

It is not just dumping money and manufacturing players in industrial scale. This mindset is just funny to watch! Football should be played with love and pleasure then you can see talented players who give their best effort to come up and shine. The story goes many rich families sending their kids there so finally they make it as some good players years later. This is not 100% right approach but providing the good facilities and trainers is a good step in right direction.

Nothing to be worried about for us. Iranians are football lovers and start kicking the ball as soon as they start to walk. Arab nations from Persian gulf should be worried because a rich giant is coming to take their place in AFC.

[Vanmonton]

It is not just dumping money and manufacturing players in industrial scale. This mindset is just funny to watch! Football should be played with love and pleasure then you can see talented players who give their best effort to come up and shine. The story goes many rich families sending their kids there so finally they make it as some good players years later. This is not 100% right approach but providing the good facilities and trainers is a good step in right direction.

Nothing to be worried about for us. Iranians are football lovers and start kicking the ball as soon as they start to walk. Arab nations from Persian gulf should be worried because a rich giant is coming to take their place in AFC.

Is that why Japan went from a 10th rate Asian team to the best in a matter of 2 decades? Same with South Korea.

China will eventually join Korea and Japan. We haven't won anything in decades. We haven't gone to the Olympics in decades, Iran hasn't won the continental cup in decades, our clubs suck hard, our infrastructure is getting worse by the day, future looks bad, competition is gaining momentum and those that are already ahead (Korea and Japan) are becoming better every day.

Iranian confidence is like American nationalism. We both like to say we're number 1, but that's rarely the case.

[Nokhodi]

China can't be compared to Korea and Japan.
The Japanese and Koreans actually love football and they have prevented corruption from destroying football.

I have been hearing China is the next big thing in football since the early 90s and every marketing agency on earth wants you to believe it.

All this money is coming from dudes with sketchy money who don't know what to do with it right now. They will pull funding as soon as they know their money is safe.

[Vanmonton]

China can't be compared to Korea and Japan.
The Japanese and Koreans actually love football and they have prevented corruption from destroying football.

I have been hearing China is the next big thing in football since the early 90s and every marketing agency on earth wants you to believe it.

All this money is coming from dudes with sketchy money who don't know what to do with it right now. They will pull funding as soon as they know their money is safe.

You couldn't be anymore off with your analysis. Football is not the most popular in either Japan or Korea, but it's the most popular in China. In Japan and Korea, baseball is the number 1 sport by a country mile. Go to Bigsoccer and open up a poll and see what the hundreds of Korean and Japanese members have to say (hint: there's already a thread about this topic).

China might be corrupt, but under the same conditions they have become the world's largest economy and conquered every other sport. Under the same conditions they are attracting most of the world's investment. Under the same conditions they have achieved things that most countries can never dream of doing.

Football is actually the most popular sport in China. If Iran, which is even more corrupt and dictatorial, with even less resources, can put a half descent team together, then so can China. And they will.

[Afat11]

No money in the world can buy talent. Ask our buddies in Qatar.

Iran is the most inherently talented footballing country in Asia. Korea and Japan are close behind us, but have closed the gap using a several decade plan. Chinese and Qatar are not this organized. Just throwing money at the wall and hoping to find quality players. It won't happen.

With just a little more investment in bringing quality coaches, better infrastructure/player development, and bringing some high quality foreigners to compete with our players in IPL to truly test our players every week in the league, then you will see Iran being a top 25 ranked team in the world. Right now, we are not there because we lack all of these things. But we will never sink out of the top 3-4 Asian teams because football is in our blood. The only teams that will ever worry me in Asia are Korea, Japan, and to a lesser extent Australia. Australia has class and quality, but I feel that we play a similar style to them, but better, and we are more consistent under CQ. Korea and Japan are still below us in my mind, but they turn it up to a high level when it counts, as do we. Those games in WCQ will always be nerve-wracking. China and Qatar are lightyears behind us though. They can really only beat us on our worst day, and I will say that today, 4 years from now, and even 10 years from now.

[Nokhodi]

You couldn't be anymore off with your analysis. Football is not the most popular in either Japan or Korea, but it's the most popular in China. In Japan and Korea, baseball is the number 1 sport by a country mile. Go to Bigsoccer and open up a poll and see what the hundreds of Korean and Japanese members have to say (hint: there's already a thread about this topic).

China might be corrupt, but under the same conditions they have become the world's largest economy and conquered every other sport. Under the same conditions they are attracting most of the world's investment. Under the same conditions they have achieved things that most countries can never dream of doing.

Football is actually the most popular sport in China. If Iran, which is even more corrupt and dictatorial, with even less resources, can put a half descent team together, then so can China. And they will.

Yes, but you're forgetting that the football that is popular is the mostly English football they watch on TV. They love the EPL.
Its the same thing in South East Asia. They all love Man Utd, Arsenal, Liverpool... but they don't give a damn about their own teams or clubs.
And sure with planning and management they will get to an average level, but in football you need a wholesale national grassroots support and following to take it to the next level. That's why its not all about money or countries like Brazil, Argentina, Columbia... wouldn't be that good.

[MR.ESTESNAII]

I would think among 1 billion people and most of them men, 11 of them can come out as good soccer players hehe I agree that most of the time our team Melli players gheyrat is what makes us win games with the limited budget they have

[Z Joon]

China, the future superpower in Asian and world football, since 1980.

But not today.... today they would struggle to even draw against war-torn Iraq who are a 2nd grade Asian team themselves. Waiting for them to become relevant in football is like waiting for IR to vanish

[Ando Teymourian]

It's great (and necessary) to be confident. However this air of overconfidence we have that we can continue on this path and still be a top team in Asia makes me worry. All the big players are either trying to improve, or are quite clearly already improving at a rapid pace. Our hopes lie on the shoulders of 1 coach and a team of players with huge hearts. It is already a struggle, but one day it just simply won't be enough.

To think we can continue like this year after year and still yield the same results is just suicide.

[tmfan]

Ma sare Zamine football dava Darim, chiniha intori kharj mikonan:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/15/footba...&iref=obinsite

Meanwhile China NT will fail to qualify for the WCQ final round again.

[Afat11]

It's great (and necessary) to be confident. However this air of overconfidence we have that we can continue on this path and still be a top team in Asia makes me worry. All the big players are either trying to improve, or are quite clearly already improving at a rapid pace. Our hopes lie on the shoulders of 1 coach and a team of players with huge hearts. It is already a struggle, but one day it just simply won't be enough.
To think we can continue like this year after year and still yield the same results is just suicide.

I feel like I am one of the hugest proponents for improving IPL's quality here on PFDC, so please don't think I'm saying we shouldn't improve our facilities, development, infrastructure, etc.

But, I really don't see a "rapid" increase in much of Asia. I see small steps forward, but honestly, I don't see many teams (outside Japan, Korea, and Australia) being any threat in the near future. A lot of these countries who have limitless funds to invest in buying big-name players, and 2 that have 1 billion+ people are not going to catch up to us anytime soon.

Their issues are clear. They don't have a footballing culture. Sure, Guangzhou Evergrande can win ACL 10 times by buying a bunch of top players. Qatar can also buy a bunch of stars, but is that really drastically increasing the amount of people playing football in the country? Every kid from age 2 has a football at their feet in Iran, and toop-pelastic is sold almost anywhere you go. 100,000 people have filled Azadi for many years. China has 1 Billion people, but I still don't see this passion for football.

To have quality in anything, there must be passion. Iranians are lucky to be a footballing nation. We have had football in our country for a looooong time. This puts us many years ahead (I'd say we are at least 50 years ahead of India, China and Qatar in football), and I don't see that gap closing in the near future. It's just my opinion, but I really don't see them as much of a threat as it seems you do.

That being said, without CQ or a coach of reasonable quality, Iran has been shown to lose focus and drop important matches. Even still, we are able to do fairly well and are still a top team in Asia. Without proper development, we risk the close countries like Australia, Japan, and Korea clearly passing us in quality. When that happens we can get unlucky and lose to a team that can tie or beat us, but I don't think that a Qatar or China could beat us consistently more than 1/10 times. The only teams I can see moving ahead of Iran in quality are those 3 teams.

I do not see China, Qatar, India, etc. or any other of those teams being able to EVER consistently defeat us and play higher quality football. Possibly in another 50 years if we invest no money, and they truly gain a strong football culture. I just don't see that happening. It's like Germany. They are a perpetual quality team. If they stopped investing in their football, they would still be fairly strong, because football has been ingrained into their culture. I would compare Iran to one of those teams in Asian football. Yes, there are teams in Europe that improve and make runs in European tournaments like Romania, Iceland, etc., but the dominant teams are the dominant teams, and have been since the 20th century, and will continue to be into the foreseeable future.

You are right that it is possible that throwing enough money could solve these countries' problems, but I don't see it. They don't have the same passion for it. When I see Chinese children playing football FOR FUN from the moment they can walk (not being forced to play. Let's be honest, that some of these players are forced to play if they show athletic quality. We know from Olympics that China does this), then they have a chance. I don't see it. I know many Chinese people through my university and grad school, and they really don't care for football. Less than Americans to be quite honest. Any Iranian I talk to wants to discuss TM. That is the difference. We care, we have a love for the sport. Qataris buying the next Messi to play for them, or Chinese trying to build a football factory with 100 million dollars won't do the job. They need the love for the sport first, then the investment. The Argentinian mercenary playing for Qatar won't play with the same gheyrat for his country as our TM players. We saw what our gheyrat can do to the man Lionel Messi himself. Shutting him down for 90+ minutes.

So, my point, don't worry too much. These countries' odds of overtaking us are slim. We should worry about our general quality though as there are only 4 WC spots and we can easily slip to #4 in quality if we don't prepare our facilities and development, and our actual Asian rivals do. That makes it dangerous for us if a hot/lucky team (North Korea 2010) happens to finish ahead of us. North Korea is not better than us, and wasn't in 2010. We got unlucky. With the proper development, that won't ever happen to Iran. Iran with more investment will continue to be light-years ahead of the other Asian team, and will dominate its 3 Asian rivals. Mark my words. When the training pitch is fixed, and hopefully there is more investment in our NT and league, you will all see, we will qualify for the next 5 world cups, and win a few Asian Cups.

Sorry for the long response, because I do agree with you. I just think that you thinking China is a legitimate short-term threat, out of luckily beating us 1-0 in a game where we hit the post 10 times is not correct. We would dominate a game with China today, and in 5 years. Anything is possible in 10-15 years, but we're okay for the meantime. We should push for more investment though. 100% agree on that.

[BacheLot]

what i know is that Betting on sports, Football especially is a Huge business in China, much bigger than the sport itself..!

i tend to suspect that the recent big football money splashed by China is more of an indirect attempt by these betting agencies working in conjunction with clubs in order to further popularize their local league where they would have easier control over rigging results in order to boost their profits..!

im also a big believer that Big Money investment is certainly the easiest and fastest way of improving anything..! but much more so if using that money wisely by hiring the proper candidates (probably foreigners, in case of chinese or asians in general) who are then empowered to fundamentally change the country's failing football structure from top down..!

i think both Japan and SK did a great job of that in the run up to hosting WC02 and in the process their football programs shotted up to the pinnacles of Asian football....!
it may just be the typically cynical me and i didnt really read that article, but just scheming through pics and seeing just a bunch of chinese trying to teach chinese kids football (blind leading the blind ) with corruption at all levels running so rampant in China, i'm skeptical of its eventual results..!!?
it will probably take the chinese a while with that approach but nonetheless improvements will come to their football sooner than later by pumping big money at it, and if they can curtail corruption better and appoint the right candidates to lead it, they just might get a relatively quick rise in asian football hierarchy that they are after ..!
anyways, the overall point of the thread maker still remains quiet valid that by comparison, IR is not nearly funding our football adequately in comparison to many other asian countries and such prolonged neglect ( in addition to the corruption that runs rampant still in our football) will surely catch up with us sooner than later..! in fact it already has at club levels, as evident by results over last 2-3 decades, football infrastructure level, and it was well on its way in TM football too, until the hiring of CQ and its subsequent resurgence back to the higher echelons of asian football..!!

[sarbaz]

Qatar's population is 700000 , China's population is 1.4 billion

China will find the talents and they will become #1 in Asia in the near future

[persianfire]

China, the future superpower in Asian and world football, since 1980.

This. The sad thing is that their national team is getting weaker and weaker.