To teach soccer, start in schools

Jin Zhiyang says China needs to concentrate on the long task of developing players while educating them

Jin Zhiyang wants to see more soccer in Chinese schools as a means of providing a base from which the sport can grow.

Jin, who attended the launch of the Chinese School Football (CSF) champions cup on Friday, said the best way to save Chinese soccer from the ignominy of match-fixing scandals and poor international performances is to foster it from the ground up.

"Only by bringing the game to schools, to be played by kids across the country, will we be able to see our hopes rise," said Jin, who was an assistant national coach under Bora Milutinovic at the 2002 World Cup.

The cup will gather more than 300 student players from 24 primary schools from 21 cities across the country to compete in a six-day tournament at the National Olympic Sports Center in Beijing during the National Day holiday (Oct 1-6).

A renowned promoter of campus soccer development, Jin said the cup is a push toward reforming the traditional system of talent cultivation, combining soccer training and school education.

"The State-run system is outdated at the grassroots level. Drafting kids at early ages and putting them in camps away from schools is not going to work today," said the 68-year-old.

"More than 90 percent of the youth are studying in schools every day. If we don't make it happen on campus, how can we make any progress?"

Jin coached the CSL's Beijing Guo'an to a league championship and two CFA Cup titles during his tenure from 1995 to 1997, then shifted his focus to developing the sport on a much smaller stage.

After retiring from pro soccer in 2003, he coached the Beijing Institute of Technology FC in the collegiate league and led it to national championships in 2004 and 2006.

The CSF program, a joint initiative between the national sports administration and the Ministry of Education, has reached more than 90 cities, involving 1.77 million students from nearly 5,000 primary and high schools since 2009. It organizes about 80,000 games a year.

Jin said it's still a high mountain to climb, citing Japan as an example.

"Japan officially brought soccer into school education in 1978 and it took more than 20 years to get results," he said. "We just started."

Japan has more than 60,000 coaches instructing student-athletes, while China has only one-third that number, Jin said.

According to an ESPN story last month on its Chinese website, Japan has more than 1 million teenagers regularly playing soccer in school, compared to 100,000 in China.

Jin said it's a matter of changing the views of parents and school leaders.

"Most of the parents still see playing soccer as a distraction from their children's studies," he said. "They would lead their kids to piano lessons or math cram schools rather than letting them free to play on turf. We have to educate them and the schoolmasters that playing soccer is also a kind of education, it is also a chance for their kids to be enrolled in colleges."

The government is taking notice.

The Ministry of Education established an office dedicated to CSF and is aiming to expand the program by providing more policy support.

"We've noticed that the traditional study-first philosophy in school principals' and parents' minds is an obstacle to promoting the sport," said Wang Longlong, an official at the office.

"We are drafting a 10-year plan for school soccer development in China and will organize a national meeting of school presidents to discuss the details on how to make it happen."

To persuade parents, more university scholarships and favorable scoring policies on college entrance examination would be provided to student players, Wang said.

sunxiaochen@chinadaily.com.cn