Village football league: simple pleasure from simple games
A long shot, a bicycle kick, a rainbow.
As a soccer fan, I haven't seen a demonstration of such sophisticated skills in domestic matches for many years. But in a recent series of soccer games staged in a remote rural community in southwest China, millions of fans like me were amazed to find many local amateur players were possessed of such world-class skills.
A 50-meter screamer resulted in a neat goal, as did a bicycle kick ― a kick executed by somersaulting backwards and moving the legs in a pedaling motion to strike the ball in midair. A rainbow is a tricky technique that involves using your foot to scoot the ball up your leg, then kicking it with your opposite heel so that it arcs over your head.
These great skills that excited the crowd ― both offline and online ― were performed not by professional football players, but by local farmers or farmer-turned butchers, barbecue chefs, fish vendors, couriers, construction workers, teachers or operators of bulldozers. They all hail from mountainous Rongjiang County, Guizhou Province, where soccer games involving 20 teams from local villages are being held every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The games, titled "Cun Chao" (Village Super League), started on May 13 and will end on July 29, the day for the final match.
A bird's-eye view of the football field hosting the ongoing Village Super League matches in Rongjiang County, Guizhou Province
Narrating a Saturday game held in Rongjiang County on June 3, former CCTV sports commentator Han Qiaosheng said the village soccer gala had surpassed the Chinese Super League in terms of viewers. He even praised Wen Xiaobo, a young football player from Zhongcheng Village, for his great performance similar to that of Jorge Campos, once a master goalkeeper from Mexico who was known for his acrobatic and flamboyant style.
There are different voices, certainly. Dong Lu, another football narrator, said recently the villagers' games were no match to those of the Chinese Super League. He even compared the villagers' performance to that of dancing aunties at outdoor plazas.
Dong's words miss the point. There's no point in deriding the village players for their amateur status. From day one the Cun Chao games have been made by and for amateurs. No professional player is allowed. Cun Chao is about play for play's sake. It's part of the local rural culture that groups villagers together in many ways, including dancing, singing and football playing.
Chinese men's professional football teams have been known for their disappointing performances for a long time. In many occasions, some players don't even run at their best. In contrast, every player from the local villages in Rongjiang County, aged from 15 to about 50, runs passionately.
"We all run as fast as we can until we're exhausted," a young player said in a recent interview.
A young football player runs passionately toward the ball as his elderly counterpart tries to intercept him.
The kids and adults from Guizhou's mountainous areas do not run for big money. Guess what their awards are? The final champion team will get an ox, with a lamb for the runner-up, a pig for the third, and a goose for the fourth. All prizes are locally raised.
Myriad netizens who have watched Cun Chao games since May 13 say that it's football in its purest form ― villagers playing passionately for sports itself.
The organizers have got no ticket income, although one game could attract more than 50,000 audience members on the spot, in addition to over 10 million who watch online. The games are free. Local villagers and visitors from outside Rongjiang County can simply bring a stool and squat at any corner around the football field, even right behind the net of a goal post.
The audiences ― local villagers and outside visitors ― sit or stand leisurely around the football field. It's a zero-distance experience in watching a football match.
In these "unprofessional" arrangements, what we see is a compassionate communal spirit that makes everyone feel at home and at ease. A young soccer fan said he had driven about 1,500 kilometers to arrive at Rongjiang for the football matches with free admission.
Another "unprofessional" scene is that many cheerleaders bring their own aluminum wash basins and beat them like drums. The cheerleaders strike at the bottom of such basins so hard that the basin is soon beaten out of shape. Some cheerleaders say with a chuckle: "This really consumes a lot of our basins!"
This grassroots simplicity in celebrating a soccer game amounts to a down-to-earth atmosphere highly appreciated by sports commentator Han and many soccer fans who have flocked to the site to feel the pulse of dynamic local life hardly seen in an urban environment. Rongjiang's tourism income in the past month or so has surpassed 200 million yuan (US$27.8 million), even though the soccer games are free.
A child runs after a football in the field during a recess.
It's about rural revitalization, but what's being revived is not just the rural economy; a rural communal spirit which makes sports part of villagers' daily life is also rising. In such a revived rural setting, sports shows its purest side, unadorned with pecuniary pursuits or other commercial considerations. Soccer has become a lifestyle. Villagers play soccer together after a day's work, and go back to work after a friendly match. No professional players.
But one day, these amateur rural players may turn out to be one of China's best footballers. Who knows?
In "The Best: How Elite Athletes Are Made", sports experts Mark Williams and Tim Wigmore point out that athletes from smaller, more rural environments often have an advantage. For example, a boy's chances of becoming a professional athlete are roughly 15 times greater if he comes from such an environment.
"Small towns tend to offer the best balance of facilities … a culture of informal play," they conclude.
Informal play, indeed, is a unique feature of Cun Chao, a fertile land for simple pleasure derived from simple sports.
