What should I do if the national football coach is too late to find a "fresh face"?


The candidate will be selected between the current coach Li Xiaopeng and the current Asian Games coach Jankovic. It is not ruled out that the two may join hands

　　According to the official information released by the Chinese Football Association, the Chinese men's football team and the Chinese men's Asian Games team will go to New Zealand in late March to play two warm-up matches with the New Zealand national team and the New Zealand U23 national team respectively.

A reporter from Beijing Youth Daily learned on the 5th that due to factors such as cooperation prices, cooperation concepts, and willingness to cooperate, the Chinese Football Association will not be able to hire suitable "new faces" to take over the national football team in the short term. The candidate will be selected between the current coach Li Xiaopeng and the current Serbian coach Jankovic of the Chinese Men's Football Asian Games Team. There is also the possibility that the two will lead the team together.

　　A number of candidates who have been speculated recently

　　Neither ideal

　　After the national football team ended its Qatar World Cup preliminaries at the end of March last year, the Chinese Football Association began preparations for a new cycle of national football preparations from the second half of the year.

The Chinese Football Association tends to choose a foreign head coach who is familiar with Asian football and can quickly get started. Olaroyu, Paulo Bento, Schmidt, Queiroz, etc. are all candidates.

　　Some media recently reported that Xu Zhengyuan, the Korean coach of the Chengdu Rongcheng Super League, and Jodi, the Spanish coach of the Zhejiang team, are also candidates for the national football team.

However, this is not the case. Neither of the above two Chinese Super League club coaches is an ideal candidate for the Chinese Football Association to select a coach.

　　A series of problems lead to

　　FA coaching hesitation

　　Since the national football team will visit New Zealand for two international A-level warm-up matches in late March this year, the Chinese Football Association can only use "internal excavation" to solve the urgent need.

It is worth noting that during the preparation work meeting of the Guozihao team held in Haikou last December, both Li Xiaopeng and Jankovic appeared at the meeting.

However, until the end of the meeting, the answer to the question of who will lead the national football team has not yet been officially confirmed.

On the issue of coaching or not, the Football Association has not yet given a final answer.

　　After that, Chen Yongliang, executive deputy secretary-general of the Chinese Football Association, who was in charge of the work of the national men's football team, was investigated and investigated by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the National Supervisory Committee's Disciplinary Inspection and Supervision Team of the State Sports General Administration and the Hubei Provincial Supervision Committee on suspicion of serious violations of discipline and law. Periodic preparations for war have a negative impact.

It is against the above-mentioned series of backgrounds that Li Xiaopeng and Jankovic have become the main options of the Football Association.

　　When to choose a new foreign teacher

　　Will depend on preparations

　　But the Football Association is still entangled in this. Take Jankovic as an example. As the current coach of the Chinese Men's Football Asian Games Team, he has been serving as the 1999 men's football team since January 2019 (now the men's Asian Games team) If his role changes when the football match of the Asian Games in Hangzhou approaches, it may affect the preparation of the Asian Games team. Due to the failure experience of picking, Jankovic may also fail in coaching due to lack of skills.

It is precisely in consideration of related possibilities that the Chinese Football Association even once considered finding other coaches to take over the Asian Games team, allowing Jankovic to focus on leading the national football team.

　　At present, Jankovic is already in Foshan, leading the men's Asian Games team to start the first training session of the new year.

Before the start of the training camp, he had communicated with the Chinese Football Association on the issue of leading the team.

It is understood that Jankovic said he would obey the work arrangements of the Chinese Football Association.

The new training plan for the national football team and multiple sets of coaching plans have been drawn up, and it is only waiting for the main leaders of the Chinese Football Association to make a choice in the near future.

　　Since the 2026 World Preliminaries Asian Top 36 and the 2023 Asian Cup will not start until the fourth quarter of 2023, so whether Li Xiaopeng, Jankovic, or the two will join hands to lead the national football team to participate in the March training and warm-up match, They all have the possibility of playing the role of "transitional coach".

As for whether the national football team will be led by a foreign coach in the future, and when to choose a new foreign coach, the Chinese Football Association will decide based on the team's preparations and warm-ups in March and other related factors.

Text/Reporter Xiao Nan

　　Coordinator/Wang Yong