Amateur soccer draws crowds to village in rural China – 9/4/2023 – Sports

Former England player Michael Owen was impressed by what he saw on the internet. “I want to congratulate Cun Chao for all the success, for the results. I wish you the best. I am sure you will become better and better,” he said.

Cun Chao, an expression that can be translated as League of Villages, was an amateur football championship held between May and July in Rongjiang County, Guizhou Province. People from across China traveled to the southwest of the country to watch the matches, with a lowland air and elaborate musical performances at intervals.

Videos have multiplied on Chinese social networks, with views in the hundreds of millions on Weibo, similar to Twitter, and over 3 billion on Douyin, a correlate of TikTok. It was one of those videos that reached the excited Owen.

The images show a relatively relaxed game, with attackers laughing at themselves with missed goals. There are also beautiful bids, and the general opinion of the regulars is that the level presented is high by the standards of the country, which, even with robust investment in the professional league, failed in the attempt to develop it in a more meaningful way.

The players are butchers, tilers, farm workers, aged 15 to 40, members of minority ethnic groups such as Dong and Miao. Intervals take on folkloric colors with performances typical of these audiences, with locals wearing traditional headdresses and dancing to the sound of “lusheng”, a musical instrument made with bamboo.

Rural Rongjiang was one of the last in China declared free of extreme poverty. Migration from the region to other parts of the country is common, with workers looking for jobs in factories and civil construction. In 2019, a video appeared on the internet in which three children begged their parents, who were about to make this migration, to stay at home.

Cun Chao provoked the opposite movement, with members of the Han majority, more than 90% of the population, going to see the matches, which had no admission charge. According to statistics from the regional government, the average attendance was over 10,000 people per game, a number similar to that of the official, professional and billionaire Chinese Super League.

There are those who dispute the spontaneity and amateurism of Cun Chao. The development of rural areas is a state policy of leader Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party. The national media, controlled by the government, has been enthusiastic. People linked to the State Administration of Sports and the Ministry of Agriculture went to the place, to see the party with their own eyes.

According to Li Mingxing, head of the Rongjiang Football Association, the county has 14 regulation-size football fields and more than 30 teams. “Improvements in sporting facilities have provided a solid foundation for events like this to flourish and encouraged people to engage in physical activity,” Lin said.

The initiative, whose success was even more palpable than the CunBA –a similar basketball event in Taipan, also in the province of Guizhou–, has been boosting the local economy with tourism. On competition days, usually Friday through Sunday, 200 to 300 booths sold food. Xiong Zhuqing, who grows and sells watermelons, said he made as much as 4,000 yuan ($1,500) a night.

Cun Chao ended on July 29, with the victory of the Chejiang village players. To the winner, the ox, a prize given to the winning team. Second place won three pigs; the third, three goats.

The championship is over, but football is still busy in the region and in much of the country. A tournament with nearly 300 amateur teams from across China is underway. Each one is named after a food.

There are those who bet that it is a passing fad, but the Rongjiang stadium continues to receive large crowds. And the Xi government promises more than 100 sporting events established in rural areas by 2035.