What makes grades?, Chinese Women's Football League | World Cup | Results
The 2023 ANZ Women's World Cup has come to an end, with Spain defeating England 1-0 to win their first Women's World Cup championship.
In the last World Cup, the Chinese women's football team was able to barely draw 0-0 against their opponent Spain in the same group.
However, in this tournament, amidst the tremendous changes in the world women's football landscape, the Chinese women's football team, who were eliminated after a devastating 1-6 defeat to England in the group stage, seemed somewhat at a loss, and even felt increasingly powerless when the Chinese men's football team competed in international competitions.
A female football practitioner admitted to reporters that the development trend of Chinese women's football is actually not as good as that of men's football.
"The world's men's football team has entered a period of stable development, and there will not be too much change in the pattern. At most, they will take 5 steps forward, and we will take 2 steps forward. However, the world's women's football team is developing rapidly, and now we are only taking 1 step forward while foreign countries are taking 10 steps forward."
Hot&Cold
After the Chinese women's football team's defeat in the group stage of the World Cup, the women's Super League has already played two rounds. Wang Shanshan, Zhang Xin and other national football players have already made appearances on the field, and Chinese women's football coach Shui Qingxia has also started a new round of player inspections.
International football players Li Mengwen and Tang Jiali will embark on another journey of studying abroad: the former will transfer from Ligue 1 to the more intense and competitive English Premier League, joining Brighton Women's Football Club; The latter has returned to La Liga and joined the women's football team of Levantes Paras.
It is understood that there will be several female football players studying abroad in overseas leagues in the future, including national football players.
In this World Cup, the final between England and Spain, as well as the domestic women's football league, have developed rapidly.
The La Liga, where overseas player Tang Jiali resides, has contributed as many as 74 international players to this year's Women's World Cup. She made more contributions to the English Premier League during her previous overseas studies, with nearly a hundred players.
In terms of on-site audience, the average number of women's football matches in the English Premier League last season was 5099. The North London derby between Arsenal and Tottenham attracted up to 47367 spectators on site.
In the quarter finals of the UEFA Champions League held in March last year, the national derby between Barcelona and Real Madrid attracted as many as 91553 spectators.
In China, most attention to women's football remains at the national team level.
According to data from FIFA, the life and death battle between the Chinese women's football team and the English women's football team, with a coverage of 59.3 million viewers, broke the single country viewing record in the history of the Women's World Cup.
On the day before the final of the Women's World Cup, Beijing Women's Football Association and Henan Zhongyuan Women's Football Association in the Women's Super League fought a relegation battle. In the end, the Beijing women's football team won 1-0 with a stunning victory. After two consecutive victories, they fled the relegation zone and climbed to 7th place in the league. But only 688 people were present to watch this crucial battle.
The threshold for Beijing women's football to watch at home is very low, and spectators only need to scan the QR code and register at the entrance to enter and watch for free. Nevertheless, the on-site audience could only barely support the three stands of the Xiannongtan Stadium.
"The first home fans of this season were the most, and then there were fewer. However, after the Women's World Cup, it feels like there are significantly more home fans. To be honest, now one-third of our home fans are family or friends, and there are very few fans who really come to watch the game," Beijing women's football coach Yu Yun told reporters.
It is worth mentioning that on the same evening of the Beijing women's football match, the Chinese Super League's Beijing Guoan and Shanghai Shenhua played a focused match, with 52500 spectators from the team, setting a record for the number of spectators in domestic football matches this year.
At the Beijing Women's Football Stadium, many fans wore Beijing Guoan jerseys to watch the game. They finished watching the women's Super League match in the afternoon and then switched to the Chinese Super League in the evening.
A fan exclaimed to the reporter, "Fortunately, the two matches didn't coincide, otherwise Beijing Women's Football Club would have fewer home fans..."
Not only Beijing, but also Shanghai, Jinan, and Wuhan, which have a relatively strong football atmosphere, are facing the same situation.
As of the 12th round, the average number of spectators at home in the Women's Super League was only 1273. The coldest sixth round of the league had an average audience of only 672 people per game.
Statistics on the number of on-site spectators for the 12th round of the women's Super League. Picture Spark
The coldness of the women's Super League is not only due to the lack of attention from "big game fans", but also due to the lack of attention from all parties, competition promotion, and quality.
A fan exclaimed, "The promotion of the Women's Super League is too limited. Sometimes, if you want to watch a women's Super League match live, you don't know when it will be played or how to buy tickets."
Some fans also suggested, "Women's Super League matches should be held in the stadiums of local Chinese Super League teams. On the one hand, the hardware conditions of the matches are better, and more importantly, there are relatively more fans around the stadiums, which can let more people know that there are still women's football teams and women's Super League in this city to watch."
At present, there is a serious polarization among women's Super League teams. Wuhan Women's Football, Shanghai Women's Football, Changchun Women's Football, and Jiangsu Women's Football, with the support of national team players, formed a championship group with a gap advantage, while the other 8 teams formed a relegation group.
As of the 12th round, the 5th ranked Shandong women's football team is 11 points behind the 4th ranked Jiangsu women's football team, but only 8 points higher than the bottom ranked Henan women's football team. As for the quality of league matches, they are uneven and generally have a slower pace.
Women's Super League standings. Although the development of the women's Super League in the picture is not satisfactory, there are still persistent fans.
This season, Meng Xiang, born in the 1980s, accompanied his wife and daughter to watch most of the home games of the Beijing women's football team on site.
"There are quite a few young players on the team this year. When I watch the game, I actually look at their growth and efforts on the field, rather than winning or losing. I think Chinese football should have less utilitarianism, and the same goes for fans. Don't just look at losing or winning," said Meng Xiang.
Liu Han, born in the 1990s, entered the women's Super League for the first time after the Women's World Cup. "The atmosphere was better than expected, and the game was also very friendly. The players focused their attention on playing football. Even if the game didn't go well, they wouldn't vent their frustrations on their teammates, opponents, or referees."
"I also feel a bit heartbroken. The team members are responsible for carrying water, collecting balls, and so on. The team didn't do these tasks, and even the big screens on site were broken, but they deserve better conditions," she said.
The unique sense of ceremony in the women's Super League also touched Liu Han deeply. After the game, the players would collectively bow and thank the coaches, referees, and spectators from various stands, and interact with the fans. These made her feel like she had no distance from the players and was very down-to-earth.
When it comes to the perseverance and support of fans, Beijing women's football coach Yu Yun is deeply moved.
"I think Beijing fans are really good. They don't just support when they win, but they don't support when they lose. The team lost 5 consecutive home games and didn't score 1 goal, which put a lot of pressure on them. But I didn't hear any fans scolding their players and calling me 'class is over'. They really support the team from the bottom of their hearts."
Do your own thing well
Although it is an established women's football club, the survival situation of Beijing women's football is not optimistic. This season is already their third season without sponsors. Yu Yun admitted that currently, many women's Super League teams have a worse survival situation than them.
Faced with various difficulties, the Beijing women's football team has not given up on "survival" in recent years. Yu Yun revealed that he may collaborate with a sports industry company in the future, which will conduct business development for the club.
On the competitive level, the low investment Beijing women's football team this season is mainly composed of young players. Fortunately, due to being backed by the Xiannongtan Sports School, the relatively complete women's football youth training system here can provide talent support for the team.
Through competition opportunities, many players have grown. For example, Pan Hongyan, who is only 18 years old, has been selected as the third goalkeeper for the Chinese Women's World Cup. Wang Yanwen, who has been selected for the Chinese women's football team, has recently made a comeback from injury and has helped the Beijing women's football team win in two consecutive games by scoring goals.
"Like the Chinese men's football team, we still need to do a good job in the league and hope to have measures to make our league more exciting, with higher quality, and better integration with youth training and campus football. The national team is a face, but without high-level league support, it is impossible to talk about it."
"Nowadays, many players studying abroad are also motivated by going to high-level platforms to improve themselves. Players like Zhang Linyan, Shen Mengyu, Yang Lina and others who study abroad have indeed made significant improvements, which is the role of the league. Of course, we still need to walk on more legs, not just rely on the Women's Super League, nor can we all go abroad to study abroad. We still need to consider the specific situation," Yu Yun urged.
Chinese women's football practitioner Yuan Hang revealed to reporters that the operating costs of domestic women's super clubs are not high at present. A strong team with 2-3 national players and foreign players, with a total season cost of approximately 20-25 million. If you want to maintain a basic survival state, investing 10 million yuan per year is enough.
1: After suffering a disastrous defeat to England and being eliminated from the group stage of the World Cup, the Chinese women's football team stood at the forefront of the storm. However, with such a strong foundation for the development of domestic women's football, it is destined that Chinese women's football will be at a loss in the face of significant changes in the world women's football landscape.
Yu Yun candidly stated that the differences between various parties are obvious now. No matter who plays or becomes a coach, there won't be much change.
"Whether it's a team member or a coach, everyone should do their own thing well, and the football decision-making team should also have a clear idea. Whether we walk fast or slow, we must always walk on the right path. Perhaps there will be some deviations in the process that can be corrected, but we cannot start turning back while walking."
"The German women's football team did not perform well in this World Cup, and there may have been a problem with their mindset. They will continue to develop football according to their old ideas. However, I believe they will make adjustments and soon become a strong team in the world. I hope we can do the same. We cannot deny some of the right things just because of a match or event with the national team, and still look further," said Yu Yun.
Regarding the development of Chinese women's football, Yuan Hang believes: "Nowadays, the world's men's and women's football teams are becoming increasingly assimilated. Not to mention England and Spain, many people may have looked down on Portuguese women's football in the past, but this time they participated in the World Cup for the first time, they almost forced the traditional strong team, the American women's football team, out of the group stage."
"So in the context of changes in the world women's football landscape, we cannot always emphasize how spiritual and environmental factors are. Practitioners should first think about whether they have done a good job in their profession."
