Yangkovic's national football team quietly realizes the dual wings of "nurturing talents for the country", observing: from "Evergrande Gang" to "Shanghai Beach" Wu Lei | men's football team | national football team
On June 20th, relying on the goals of two international players, Wu Lei and Jiang Guangtai, from Shanghai Haigang, the Chinese men's football team coached by Yankovic defeated the Palestinian team 2-0 in Dalian, ushering in two consecutive international A-level warm-up matches and achieving zero goals in both matches. In this game, Wu Lei scored his 30th personal goal for the Chinese national football team, and naturalized international player Jiang Guangtai also scored his first goal for the team.
During Lippi's coaching period, the Chinese national football team basically changed their jersey version to "Guangzhou Hengda Team"; During the coaching period of their successors Li Tie and Li Xiaopeng, the Chinese national football team was always held hostage by non blood naturalized players such as Aloisio, Fernando, and Alan, who had completed operations at Guangzhou Evergrande; After the Chinese national football team entered the era of Jankovic, Guangzhou Evergrande's high-profile promotion of "nurturing talents for the country" led to a healthier and more united "two wings flying together".
Hub location, harbor and national foot play the core role
The Chinese national football team, coached by Yankovic, swept Myanmar 4-0 and defeated Palestine 2-0, bringing joy to Chinese fans. Although the warm-up matches cannot explain too much, and the Chinese national football team also wants to win the games they deserve in the future, they have defeated two Asian teams in two warm-up matches, showing a glimmer of brilliance for this team.
Illustrated: Wu Lei and Jiang Guangtai scored goals to help the Chinese national football team defeat the Palestinian team 2-0 at home.
As the temporary leader of the 2023 Chinese Super League, Shanghai Haigang team has a certain advantage in personnel configuration, and Yankovic has raised the banner of "borrowing" in building the national football team. The list of 24 Chinese national football players includes 7 members from Shanghai Haigang team, including Wu Lei, Yan Junling, Zhang Linpeng, Jiang Guangtai, Wang Shenchao, Xu Xin, and Wei Zhen. It is the club with the most Chinese national football players sent by the top 16 teams in the Chinese Super League.
Not only is the number of national football players leading, but the Haigang national team also plays a core role in key positions such as goalkeeper, center back, and striker in the national football team. Coach Yankovic adopts an internationally accepted approach by directly copying the team members from the top ranked clubs to the national team: Chinese football goalkeeper Yan Junling has kept zero starting blocks twice; The center back duo of the Haigang team, Jiang Guangtai and Zhang Linpeng, continued to start for the Chinese national football team, with the only change being that Zhang Linpeng was fine tuned to right back; The forward line of the Chinese national football team adopts a one high and one fast combination of Wu Lei and Elkesen, which is also the championship level forward configuration for Shanghai Haigang team to dominate the 2018 Chinese Super League.
From the data, the Haigang national team, who are the core players, have delivered good results: only in the goal scoring stage, Zhang Linpeng and Jiang Guangtai each scored a goal, and Zhang Linpeng's goal helped the Chinese national team break the deadlock in their first game, fully deserving of the captain's armband; Wu Lei scored 3 goals in 2 matches, which is the most trusted scoring point for the Chinese football team. Apart from Lin Liangming scoring the remaining goal, the three international players transported by Shanghai Port managed to score five goals, accounting for 83% of the total.
A port international told me, "The configuration of the national football team's defensive line is basically similar to our configuration in the club. We are very familiar with each other and don't need too much verbal communication, just a glance is enough. Everyone plays in the Chinese Super League together and is familiar with each other, so when it comes to the national team, this personnel configuration is still the same. The position of the center back can stand well, and playing is more confident."
National foot tycoon, Shanghai Transportation Group's advantage
During this international match, the Chinese national football team, the men's football Asian Games team, and the U17 national youth team will each compete, attracting the bright moonlight of Chinese fans. The Shanghai team has the highest number of national football players, not only in the adult men's national team. In the men's football Asian Games team and the U17 national youth team, the number and quality of personnel delivered by Shanghai teams also remain strong, quietly forming a "group army advantage" of national and Shanghai style delivery.
On the 19th, the men's football Asian Games team defeated the South Korean U24 team 1-0 in Jinhua, Zhejiang. Sun Qinhan, who scored a crucial goal, now plays for the Cangzhou Lions team. However, he has been playing football at the Genbao base on Chongming Island and is a teammate in the 1999-2000 age group, along with Zhu Chenjie and Jiang Shenglong. He helped the Shanghai National Games team win the men's football gold medal at the Tianjin National Games. In fact, Sun Qinhan comes entirely from the Shanghai youth training system, and he himself bluntly said after the game, "I came from Hefei to Shanghai to learn football at the age of 10. Looking back, first of all, I want to thank Xu Genbao for guiding me and cultivating me."
It complements the core of the Chinese national football team with the Shanghai Haigang national team, while Shanghai Shenhua is a major player in the men's football team's Asian Games. In the list of 26 players for the men's football Asian Games team, Shanghai Shenhua also delivered up to 7 players: Wen Jiabao, Zhu Chenjie, Jiang Shenglong, Liu Ruofang, Wang Haijian, Zhang Wei, and Xu Haoyang. Among them, Zhu Chenjie and Jiang Shenglong have basically secured the position of the team's main center backs, while the other players have also performed excellently.
It is also worth mentioning that the Chinese National Olympic team coached by Cheng Yaodong had previously gone to Croatia for long-term training, and Shanghai Shenhua team was also the club with the largest number of national Olympic players. Zhu Yue, Zhu Qiwen, Jin Shunkai, Jiang Zhixin, and He Longhai, among others, made the list. Liu Zhurun and Abrahan Halik from Shanghai Port are also eligible members of the Chinese Olympic team. In the 30 man squad of the Chinese Olympic team, two professional clubs in Shanghai also teamed up to transport 7 players.
The U17 national youth team coached by Yang Chen is currently competing in Thailand for the U17 Asian Cup, and the team is still striving to advance. In the 23 player roster of U17 Junior High School, four players from Shanghai Port were selected, namely Kuai Jiwen, Liming, Liu Tiecheng, and Zhang Junjie; Four members from the Shanghai Shenhua team were also selected, namely Wu Qipeng, Liu Chengyu, Huang Zheng, and Xuan Dongxu. In addition, Shanghai Genbao Base has selected Ouyang Jiaxin, and Shanghai has sent up to 9 U17 national youth players, almost occupying half of the country.
From Zhang Linpeng, Wu Lei, and Yan Junling supporting the pivotal position of the Chinese national football team, to Zhu Chenjie, Jiang Shenglong, and Sun Qinhan playing a major role in the men's football Asian Games team, and then to young talents such as Kuai Jiwen scoring beautiful goals in the U17 national youth team - many of the players trained and transported by Shanghai have a distinct imprint of "produced from the root treasure base". They have gradually formed a group army advantage in the men's football national brand, becoming a beautiful scenery line.
Flying together on both wings, forming a joint force for the country's nurturing talents
In the later stages of Lippi's coaching of the Chinese national football team, Chinese football made an unprecedented non blood related naturalization operation. Several Brazilian foreign players who played for Chinese Super League clubs, such as Elkson, Aloisio, Alan, and Fernando, temporarily gave up their Brazilian nationality and joined Chinese nationality after receiving generous settling and signing fees, and put on the national football jersey. During that period, the annual salary of Chinese football coach Lippi was paid by Guangzhou Evergrande; The naturalization operation of non blood related naturalized national football players was also completed by Evergrande with a heavy investment - Guangzhou Evergrande aptly calls it "nurturing talents for the country!"!
Evergrande is indeed the most proactive club in responding to the naturalization policy. According to Guangdong media statistics, Evergrande has invested up to 2 billion yuan in non blood related naturalization, of which Gaolat alone spent nearly 500 million yuan: 100 million yuan in signing and settling fees, and 400 million yuan in contracts. Due to Gao Lat not meeting the conditions to represent the Chinese national football team, Evergrande's 500 million yuan was ultimately lost, and the related expenses for him to renounce his Chinese nationality were only 250 yuan.
Similarly, Aloisio and Alan, who now play as Chinese players in their native Brazil, and Fernando, who is a "motorcycle" in Mount Taishan, Shandong, are unsuccessful non blood naturalization operations.
Of course, the efforts made by Guangzhou Evergrande to naturalize national football players should not be completely erased. In the national football team coached by Yankovic, there are two naturalized players operated by Evergrande, who now play important roles: forward Akerson and defender Jiang Guangtai. Exxon, originally named Elkson, although his competitive peak is no longer due to aging and declining performance, he still has competitiveness in the center position.
He and Wu Lei have been partnering with Shanghai Haigang team for three years, and they have a very good understanding of each other. Coupled with their return to the Chinese Super League and joining Chengdu Rongcheng this season, Exxon's form has significantly improved. Jiang Guangtai, originally named Browning, comes from the Everton youth academy in the English Premier League. He has Chinese ancestry and is now the strongest center back candidate in the national football team, with astonishing physical fitness.
In my opinion, in the past, Evergrande's operation of naturalizing players to support the country was like walking on one leg. The loss of the Chinese national football team to the Vietnamese team away on the second day of the Lunar New Year has long proven that the complete domestication of the Chinese national football team is not reliable; Nowadays, with the "Chongming Island Phase I" trained by Xu Genbao becoming the core veteran of the Chinese national football team, including the "Chongming produced" and "Shanghai transported" youth guards of the men's football Asian Games team and the national youth team, there is a continuous emergence, and it is expected to gradually take over in the future. This actually points the way for the national football team: the patient cultivation of local talents and the filling of individual positions are the true meaning of "nurturing talents for the country".
Nowadays, the Chinese national football team coached by Yankovic seems to be trying to "walk on two legs" - reusing local core international players from Shanghai Port, and also incorporating strong and willing naturalists such as Jackson and Jiang Guangtai into the system. In the long run, just like the Shanghai style football represented by Genbao Base, which continuously delivers Yan Junling, Wu Lei, Zhu Chenjie, Jiang Shenglong, and Kuai Jiwen to the Chinese national football team, just like Lin Liangming from Guangdong's enlightenment but blooming in Dalian, if every province, city, and professional club is willing to take concrete steps to cultivate their excellent youth training talents, "nurturing talents for the country" can truly achieve two wings flying together.
Respecting the laws of football, exploring and cultivating young training talents, and planting trees steadfastly, rather than hastily cutting down trees that others have worked hard to plant for a long time - and then introducing naturalized players in certain areas that are indeed lacking, this is the healthy ecology of Chinese football's "nurturing the country", and the ultimate benefit is also Chinese football itself.
