New expat soccer league kicks off in Shenzhen
Posted: 09/5/2013 2:00 pmThe first season of the new Shenzhen International Amateur Football League (SIAFL) for expats kicked off on Monday, as 128 expats playing across eight teams got together in Futian District, despite heavy rain. The deadline to join the new league was August 15.
SIAFL said in an official statement earlier this year: “Unlike the other big cities in the East of China, Shenzhen has yet to create a foreign run amateur football league. Leagues in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Hong Kong have been running successful for decades now, and it’s time for Shenzhen to catch up.”
The eight-a-side matches last a full 90 minutes, and the league runs for 14 weeks with games every Monday night. The teams are: SZ Tigers FC, SWIS, Lunatics FC, Colombian Dream, Inter SZ FC, Dog & Duck FC, World United FC, and The Wild Geese. Some interesting names.
Some of the expats involved in the SIAFL spoke with Shenzhen Daily on Monday to share their thoughts and feelings on the expat league.
“Our utmost goal, if possible, is to form a high-level Shenzhen expat team and join an eight-a-side tournament against other teams in Asia. That dream might have seemed hard to realise a few years ago for the expat football community,” Nick Thompson, the chairman and cofounder of SIAFL, told the Daily.
“About 12 years ago, there was only one expat football team in Shenzhen. As the expatriate community in the city has expanded and with the unremitting effort of people who love the sport, we finally set up the league and hopefully it will develop sustainably and healthily, even when the initiators have left the city,” he said.
Timothy Aldous, a self-employed American businessman who plays for SZ Tigers FC, also shared his thoughts with the Daily.
“When I came to Shenzhen four years ago, I barely knew any people who shared the same interest as me. Football has brought me joy and helped me to get connected with other expats. The league has provided me with the opportunity to meet more people,” Aldous said.
In an official press release back July, SIAFL also talked about sponsorship opportunities for local companies: “Sponsorship of the SIAFL will allow companies to strengthen their identity and to demonstrate their commitment to the growth and development of football in Shenzhen. It provides companies with a clear communication platform from which to articulate its intent and meet its business objectives.
“Local football sponsorship promotes a positive attitude in society. We are looking for help to create a bright and memorable event, which will increase your brand loyalty and create a positive attitude towards your product. It develops a relationship with current and potential customers.”
Guangzhou also has a similar expat football league called The Guangzhou International Football League (GZIFL), which comprises mostly of foreign players. The new season over in Guangzhou will kick off on September 8.
For more information about SIAFL, including a fixtures, news, tables, stats, players, and teams, check out SIAFL’s official website.
Photo credit: SIAFL
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Reflecting on Liu Xiang’s flameout now that the London Olympics have drawn to a close
Posted: 08/13/2012 4:26 pmHurdler Liu Xiang became the golden boy of Chinese athletics after becoming the country’s first competitor to win Olympic gold in a track and field event in 2004. But for the second olympics in a row he has crashed out as a nation expected. This second successive disappointment drew more than 2 million posts in the space of an hour on Chinese microblogs.
Handsome and likeable, people in China have every reason to love Liu along with other star Olympians such as Lin Dan and Chen Ding. But the world of sport is not supposed to be kind, and being a fan involves learning to meet heartache with stoicism.
Certain media have neglected to report that there were other competitors in the heat in which Liu fell last Tuesday. In fact, but four other male hurdlers fell in the heats. This has been attributed by netizen Li Yi to the British hosts making the hurdles 4.3cm taller than the standard on which all but the British athletes trained. Needless to say, Chinese netizens aren’t happy.
One Sina Weibo user screamed, “England, go and die!” The sentiment was echoed around Chinese cyberspace, but it’s common knowledge that home advantage is important in sport, and in 2008 China faced all kinds of allegations about cheating. It is hardly a coincidence that the country’s highest ever medal haul came on home soil. Having a victim complex is not an attractive quality in a person, why would that principle not apply to an entire country?
The Dutch soccer team of the 1970s is widely regarded as the greatest never to have won a World Cup. In 1974, they lost in the final to West Germany after a German newspaper published allegations about Dutch captain Johann Cruyff cheating on his wife. Cruyff had to spend the night before the final on the phone explaining himself. This was part of the reason why Cruyff did not go to the following World Cup in Argentina where the Dutch, captained by Cruyff’s very able lieutenant Johann Neeskens, lost again in the final to the hosts who were widely thought to be guilty of much skullduggery.
But that Dutch team is still remembered much more fondly than the teams that dispatched it because its dazzlingly talented members played with a flair and a joie de vivre that most athletes in the current Chinese system have beaten out of them before they reach puberty, if they even get that far.
There are two types of people who are wasting their lives as surely as any drug addict, alcoholic or fashion journalist: expats who spend their time whining about the fact that China isn’t fair, and Chinese who imagine the whole world is sufficiently interested in them to conspire against them.