The national football team has no progress in selecting coaches, and “the combination of soil and foreign countries” has become an alternative
It is not ruled out that Li Xiaopeng will continue to lead the team or arrange for Jankovic to “transfer” and “Li Yang join hands” are also options
On January 29, the Chinese Football Association released the notice of the first training session of the Chinese Men’s Football Asian Games Team in 2023 through official channels. The team coach is still the Serbian coach Jankovic. It is understood that in the absence of substantial progress in the selection of foreign coaches for the national football team, the current coach Li Xiaopeng and the men’s Asian Games coach Jankovic are both options of the Chinese Football Association, and the Football Association does not even rule out arranging them to lead the team together. The first training session of the National Football Team for the new year may be postponed to March, which is the first international match day window of this year.
There is no substantial progress in the selection of coaches
In fact, since the second half of last year, discussions around the preparations for the new cycle of the national football team have already started in the Chinese Football Association. After repeated research and communication, the Football Association tends to choose a foreign coach with outstanding professional ability, familiar with Asian football and able to get started quickly for the national football team. However, judging from the current actual situation, the selection of coaches is affected by factors such as ideas and prices, and there has been no substantial progress for the time being.
Prior to this, including Queiroz, Paulo Bento, Stojkovic, Olaroiu, and Renard, some foreign coaches who led the team to participate in the World Cup in Qatar or had coached in the Super League had all In the list of candidates for the national football coach selection. The Chinese Football Association even made direct contact with some of the coaches, but the feedback they got was not ideal. The prices offered by some foreign teachers are unacceptable to the Chinese Football Association.
“Li Yang hand in hand” is one of the options
For this reason, the Chinese Football Association had to prepare other coaching plans. After all, this year is the year of major football competitions. The national football team will face the important tasks of the second stage of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers in the Asian region and the 2023 Asian Cup. Time to implement team reorganization matters.
According to the reporter of Beijing Youth Daily, the Chinese Football Association has already predicted the possible situation that the new foreign coach will not be able to be in place for a short time. Therefore, it does not rule out that the current coach Li Xiaopeng will continue to lead the team or arrange for Jankovic to “transfer” to take over the national football team. The team leadership model of “Li Yang joins hands” is also one of the options of the Football Association. During the Spring Festival, the two main leaders of the Chinese Football Association, Du Zhaocai and Chen Xuyuan, went to Bahrain to participate in the AFC member congress. The selection of coaches will not continue until they return to China and have results.
The first training session of the national football team may be postponed to March
It is worth noting that in the training notice of the Chinese men’s football team for the Asian Games, it is clearly stated that the purpose of this training camp is not only to prepare for the Hangzhou Asian Games football match, but also to prepare talents for the national team. In fact, among the 24 players selected for the men’s football team for the Asian Games, Zhu Chenjie and Dai Weijun had already served as the main force of the national football team in the top 12 of the Qatar World Preliminaries held last year, and many other players were selected during the training camp in Shanghai a year ago. National Football Team. In other words, under the background that the national football team is facing a new generation, a considerable part of the players in this Asian Games team will become the strength that the national football team relies on in the future.
Although the 24 players selected for the men’s football Asian Games team are all players in the 1999 age group, Zhang Yuning, Zhang Linpeng, and Wu Xi, as candidates for the team’s overage players, once rushed to represent the Asian Games after finishing their journey to the top 12 with the National Football Team in March last year. Team training. To a certain extent, this mixed Asian Games team plus Wei Shihao, Xu Xin and other players in the 1993-1995 age group will form the prototype of the main lineup of the national football team in the new cycle. Jankovic is familiar with the situation of most of these players, so it is actually normal for him to become one of the candidates for the new coach of the national football team.
As of now, the answer to the question of the selection of coaches for the national football team has not yet been obtained, and the window for the first phase of this year’s FIFA Men’s Football International Match Day will not open until late March, so the first training session of the national football team this year may be postponed to March. At that time, no matter whether it is a foreign coach leading the team or Li Xiaopeng stays in office, they can carry out specific work relatively calmly.
Text/Reporter Xiao Nan Coordinator/Wang Yong
