Letters | For football’s sake: why China should host World Cup, even in face of defeat

Readers discuss how hosting the tournament will help Chinese football, Hong Kong’s strengths as an insurance hub, and why tourists are not flocking back to the city

Reading Time:4 minutes

China’s players greet spectators after a Fifa World Cup qualification match in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on October 12, 2021. China have not played in the World Cup proper since 2002. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 11:30am, 21 Dec 2022

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The Fifa World Cup in Qatar has drawn to a close. The majority of Hong Kong soccer fans have been happy to see Lionel Messi holding up the trophy for the winning team, Argentina, and drowning in ecstasy.

Earlier on, there was talk, including in the Western media, of China hosting the World Cup in 2030.

South Korea and Japan co-hosted the World Cup in 2002, and both nations did well in that tournament. Undeniably, both these soccer teams have since risen to a level that has raised quite a few eyebrows.

Meanwhile, the Chinese football team have not lived up to the expectations of many Chinese fans. Some even suspect China is not in the running to host the World Cup simply to avoid the embarrassment of the home team scoring zero goals.

If this face-saving decision has indeed been made by the Chinese soccer authorities, it is a big blunder. Don’t they have happy memories of the 2002 World Cup, with China having kicked their way to their first berth in the tournament and all Chinese people being sent into a frenzy? Commemorative stamps were even issued on the mainland and in Hong Kong and Macau.