Hard lessons from China
Everybody loves a winner and woe unto those who fall short (except possibly John Carlos and Peter Norman from the 1968 Mexico Olympics) because not too many of them would merit even a “What’s his/her name?”
If a team or a country makes it to the top of the podium in any highly competitive sport significant enough to be included in the Olympic or Asiad calendar, then you can expect that discipline to gain an immediate following, but not necessarily a huge one or pull in more fans, especially if it is basketball that is on the table.
If either does not, then you can forget filling to the rafters fairly international-standard venues such as the Rizal Memorial Football Stadium (RMFS) in Manila for a match between a visiting eleven and the national football team, the Philippine Azkals, or the Mall of Asia arena for a FIBA qualifier.
Until the Azkals made it for the first time to the prestigious multination 2019 Asian Cup that will be held in Qatar in January next year, attendance at the RMFS and even at the Panaad Stadium in football-crazy Bacolod City (Negros Occidental) was dwindling.
This unprecedented achievement of Philippine football, possibly, would rub in on the country’s participation in this year’s Suzuki Cup that will kick off in November in a positive way, considering that we are hosting a number of matches for an important Southeast Asian futbol competition.
China, meanwhile, is unlikely to see the beautiful game evolving into a sport that would be adored by the more than one billion Chinese, even in a way even remotely resembling their adoration for table tennis or gymnastics.
The reason is a no-brainer: The Chinese national eleven hardly wins matches whether they are internationals or friendlies.
Just last Saturday in Beijing, the team settled for a scoreless draw with lowly India, reportedly “sparking outrage among China’s legions of football-obsessed fans.”
The report said, “It [scoreline] is a setback for China’s unbridled footballing ambitions — President Xi Jinping is a big fan of the sport and has vowed to make the country a football superpower.”
In a million years, perhaps, Xi or his successors would be able to deliver on that promise but, for now, China does not even have a Chinaman’s chance of making it to the World Cup in the next several years.
Incidentally, the Chinese president is visiting the Philippines this November.
The apparent indifference of the mainlanders to football extends to tennis, a “Western” thing that is Greek to ordinary Chinese, and Filipinos as well who would prefer basketball any time of year.
In the first two weeks of this month, there were tournaments — all sanctioned by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) or the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) — in Beijing, Chengdu, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Tianjin, Wuhan and a few other cities that featured the likes of Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic and Aryna Sabalenka and Sloane Stephens.
But these tournaments were playing to slick, visibly world-class and empty venues and magbisikleta ka pa, wala kang masasagasaan.
Apparently, the tennis stars were just there for the big prizes or they had no choice but to take part in them because participation was mandatory under ATP or WTA rules.
But with China, money, also apparently, is no object.
In the final analysis, there’s neither rhyme nor reason in ramming down the throat of fans sports that they simply don’t care about.
Mercifully, more Filipinos, in this corner’s opinion, are taking to football albeit slowly, gradually, because they believe that the Philippine Azkals are good enough to play with the big boys (the Chinese, evidently, are not).
Such growing enthusiasm of Pinoys for football cannot be said of the Chinese in general, Chinese Super League or no Chinese Super League.
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