Chinese football fans and media rounded on the national team on Friday after they suffered fresh humiliation in a 7-0 thrashing to rivals Japan in World Cup qualifying.
President Xi Jinping once said he wanted China to host and even win the World Cup one day, but that ambition looked further away than ever after a chastening evening in Saitama on Thursday.
China had only squeezed into the decisive third round of qualifying for the 2026 World Cup thanks to a superior head-to-head record over Thailand. China have reached the World Cup only once before, in 2002.
They are still alive in the group despite the desperate start, but Oriental Sports Daily said it was China’s heaviest World Cup qualifying defeat.
“When the taste of bitterness reaches its extreme, all that is left is numbness,” it said. The Paper in Shanghai said that Chinese football had hit “rock-bottom” and called it a “disastrous defeat”.
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