CRI听力:Football Business to Make the Better of Scandal

Like many public institutions in China, the Chinese Football Association evolved from a centrally planned state administration to one that effects market-oriented reforms.

The role of the association now is to organize and manage the country's professional league games.

But, in the past, it was tasked with administering regulations for all who are involved in football.

That included players, coaches, referees and their paychecks and career moves.

Gao Chao, manager of the Beijing Guo'an Football Club.

"The association used to decide everything from a player's salary to the prize money of each league match. How much money your club could get if you won a game, how much you would get if you only made a draw, how much you would win as host and how much you would win as a guest. All the club owners knew the rules set by the association."

It's not hard to imagine people with such power would turn the situation to their favor to benefit themselves.

But Gao says such a system was not meant to be retained in the first place and was there only because football as a business was not large enough to be self-sustaining.

Gao adds that even today some top clubs in the country's premier league cannot command sufficient public broadcast coverage because of unsuccessful business.
And the league itself cannot organize games on its own because of the cost of mobilizing resources such as public security, broadcast coverage and the training of young players.

Ma Dexing, Deputy Editor in Chief of China Titan Sports, agrees that football should be regarded as a business or more precisely as a consumer good.
 
As such, the only way it can survive and thrive is to have a reasonably large capacity to produce these goods and a sustainable population of consumers.

"Our professional league started in 1994, and our close neighbor Japan started around the same time. How come they developed so fast? In 1992, we had 13,000 students who were regularly playing football, but over in Japan, they had 7,700 teams with 210,000 students under the age of 12 who were actively playing in games. Adding the social wealth of Japan at that time and their market maturity—could it come as any more of a surprise?"

Ma says once fans in China become interested in seeing good quality football matches delivered, and clubs become sufficiently interested in improving their performances, those who are in various ways involved in the business would make sure they perform their duties better as well.

Therefore, it is in everyone's interest to root out corruption and irregularities and make football a clean yet profitable business.

In light of this argument, Gao says he is confident that football as a business is taking shape because what appears to be a depressing scandal is also an outburst of huge public interest.

"Every industry cleans itself up and makes the better of its past wrongdoings. The fact that there is so much attention focused on the football scandal only proves that we have gained considerable popularity."

In addition, giving justice to what North Korea has achieved in its recent football matches, Ma says there is much more to football than getting the best 11 guys in your country to compete for national pride.

He adds to really make it a business that contributes to society, whether it is as a taxpayer or simply as a form of popular entertainment, will take time and a conscientious effort.

For CRI, I'm Robert Costelloe.