It all started when Sergey Nagornyak, a product of Vinnitsa football, went to work in the Celestial Empire—a person with a scandalous reputation due to doping troubles in the autumn of 1997. Sergey, who had missed a year because of disqualification, returned to football and even received an invitation from Donetsk Shakhtar, but apparently could not play at the level he had before the break. Perhaps the most acceptable option for Nagornyak in that situation was to leave for a country where no one had heard of him before. The Chinese option seemed the best to Sergey and to the people who handled his employment.
And it somehow suddenly turned out that on the banks of the Huang He and the Yangtze they also know how to play football. Moreover, they are ready to develop it and improve their football economy, progress and eventually become one of the world leaders in this sport. The human potential in China, territory of which is home to a fifth of the world's population, is enormous. But for this factor to work, conditions are required. And they were not long in coming.
Those who visited China in the late 1980s and made their next trip to this country a year or two ago have surely received the richest material for comparison and analysis. The country simply amazes with its cleanliness, abundance of greenery, brand-new buildings, and well-maintained territory.
Cardinal changes did not bypass local football either. The game of millions in the 'country of a billion' had been a passion before as well. But that love had almost no support, and interest was doomed to languish. It got to the point where teams coming to China gave the locals sets of football uniforms, balls, gloves, because the Chinese themselves had none of this.
Nowadays everything is different. They have taken up football seriously. A semblance of a professional league has existed for ten years. The state's hand is felt everywhere—in managing the national team, the national championship, and attracting sponsors. That is the foundation of foundations. And the money of rich (or merely wealthy) companies is meant to complement the material strength of Chinese clubs. And it's not just with equipment that everything is in order. Stadiums are being built, and such ones that we now have to envy.
This symbiosis yields results. The championship becomes more interesting every year, generations of footballers capable of making a name for themselves abroad (particularly in Europe) appear, and the national team has finally made it to the World Cup.
Not least, words of gratitude should be addressed to foreigners. After all, it was their talent, efforts, and skills that served as an example to follow, and it was their ideas that the Chinese implemented on the ground and that brought results.
In order for good football masters to be drawn to China, it was necessary to lure them with good financial conditions. Money was not spared for this (although they counted it), but they demanded that the legionnaires be thoroughly prepared in all respects. Particularly famous in football circles were the tests used by Chinese officials to weed out those who, in their opinion, were not ready to perform in the Chinese championship. The essence of the test is track-and-field exercises for speed and endurance.
The exercises, it must be admitted, are rather difficult. Suffice it to say that the celebrated striker Oleg Salenko, who scored six goals at the 1994 World Cup, had some problems with them and ultimately did not receive permission to work. An absurd situation, of course, but the Chinese have their own concept of football (as of everything else), which they consider the most correct. True, in recent years these tests have either been abolished or softened. Because otherwise the Englishman Paul Gascoigne, a famous footballer but a drunkard and a brawler, who for several years has been far from optimal physical condition, would not have appeared in Chinese football.
The Ukrainian legion in China is small. The first Ukrainian is the aforementioned Nagornyak. He, by the way, plays in the same team as the Russian Sergey Kiryakov and the Frenchman Nicolas Ouédec (for those who don't know, I'll note that both were known throughout Europe in the early and mid-1990s) under the guidance of Russian specialist Valery Nepomnyashchy. The very one who, together with the Cameroon team, worked a miracle at the 1990 World Cup in Italy. The second is a famous goalkeeper in the past, and now a coach, Leonid Koltun, working in the second Chinese division with the team 'Jiangsu'. The third is a product of Kiev football, Yevgeny Konovalenko, playing under the direction of Leonid Yakovlevich or (as they call him in China) Coach Lesha. It is Koltun—the most experienced of the three—who will be given the floor, in which the native of Kharkiv will share his impressions of the 'Chinese specifics'.
- Professional football in China is only ten years old, but from the very first days they began to invest good money in it, which someone immediately decided to cash in on. Problems appeared. Games began to be bought and sold, footballers started to be pampered, referees were offered bribes... But they quickly sorted that out. Last year, referees were forced to return the money they had received, and they brought in about 30 million yuan (about $4 million). They warned: if you took money, bring it back; whoever refuses—prison. One—an international-level referee—dug in his heels. They gave him, if I'm not mistaken, about ten years. He's already serving. Now a security body is being created that will monitor referees and players. After all, footballers also sold games. This year there are already far fewer problems. When the older, pampered generation goes away, the game will become cleaner. Young players are not spoiled with money...
Footballers' education? There's no point in talking about a full-fledged one. I constantly propose organizing lectures and courses at the club. Players need to develop. They step outside the base gates and they're lost. They're completely unprepared for life, hardly read newspapers, don't study. Age is 22, but in terms of development they're about 17.
When I was about to come here, they asked me, over and over: what China? But I've been through so much in life that nothing could scare me. I came here and my opinion changed for the better. I arrived right after the coach had been fired from the team. The general director really didn't want a foreigner. All his entourage and assistants were against me. And the president had left and left an order: find a coach in 10 days. Everyone was afraid to make a decision alone and decided to meet collectively. I came to the meeting - about twenty people were sitting there: deputy presidents, a few women, a couple of university professors, graduate students, coaches. They asked me to share my opinions on the team's losses. I tried to explain in football terms, but then I remembered Ostap Bender, Vasyuki, and I was off. They tried to slow me down with various questions, but my methodological base is excellent - they didn't succeed.
I intended to grab this opportunity. After the troubles in the Ukrainian championship, I took a pause, and then quite by chance I came across a Chinese man who was defending his dissertation in Kyiv. During the conversation it turned out that their club needed a coach. So I went to China. At first, I wasn't taken seriously. The translator was weak and couldn't convey my thoughts to journalists and management. And there were problems with the footballers - they all looked alike. But gradually I figured things out. We started playing, winning, got into the top three. But not everyone was pleased with me.
The next season they really went after me. They did all sorts of things, just mocked me! I ate once a day, and even then they gave me all sorts of crap, all rotten. I withered away, but I held on. Then at some point I couldn't take it anymore, turned over the tray and left the dining hall. And in the evening, I see the Chinese drinking, rejoicing - celebrating their victory over me. The Ukrainian coach will leave soon. Not so! In the morning a translator ran to me: "Lesha, the team refused to eat!" Like, the coach doesn't eat - and we won't either. All the players showed solidarity. The general director had to come and bow to me.
But I didn't talk to him. The game was in two days, and I refused to live at the base. We were moved to a normal hotel. The club president, by the way, treated me very well (I was the first foreigner to visit his home). But I dug in and left for Kyiv.
The general director brought new coaches from Yugoslavia. It got so bad that, being in fourth place, they sold the game. The scandal was terrible. The general director was fired, and players from four (!) teams involved in this affair were disqualified. Some for life, some for six months. They started playing with reserve players and lost seven matches in a row. They remembered me...
In general, there's a lot of interesting things here. I can't tell you everything. Tests, training camps that last a month and are held at a closed base with militarized security, where you can leave only on Sundays... But something else surprises me more. Here the soil is pure clay. And yet literally everything grows on it. There's no black soil and none is expected. But they planted grass and it grew. For us, making a lawn is a worldwide problem. Apparently, people work differently. I can only guess what harvest they would get on our fertile lands. In economics, China will soon overtake both Europe and America.
Unfortunately, I didn't get to see the country. I was only in the cities where the team played. But I'm amazed by Shanghai! What architecture, cleanliness, parks! Greenery is given special importance. And how they build! Wide streets, they plan everything a hundred years ahead. We still have a lot to learn from them.