Xi Jinping’s World Cup diplomacy; So why is Xi so obsessed with football? The reason is because football is a part of his strategy to overcome the United States

June 9, 2014 Leave a comment

Xi Jinping’s World Cup diplomacy

June 03,2014

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Table tennis is China’s national sport. The chance of a Chinese player, male or female, winning the World Table Tennis Championships is more than 90 percent. The Chinese say their Ping-Pong players are the best in the universe; they are proud that no other country is a match for China. We don’t need to discuss so-called Ping-Pong diplomacy to know that the sport is China’s pride. 
But lately, table tennis is not so popular in China. It has been replaced by football, which Chinese President Xi Jinping loves. The leader kicked off a soccer match during a state visit to Ireland, and, when he met with Dutch football legend Edwin van de Sar, he asked him about his techniques. In “Dream of China,” his political ideology, he has included hosting and winning the World Cup.
So why is Xi so obsessed with football? The reason is because football is a part of his strategy to overcome the United States. While table tennis is a charming sport, it does not suit the image of a great power, a member of the G-2. Chinese sports critic Yang Hua said that football should be named the official national sport of China.
It is hard to find the dynamic energy of tens of thousands of cheering football fans in table tennis.
Ping-Pong is an indoor sport and does not correspond to Xi’s grand ambition to compete against the United States for hegemony. Moreover, football is a sport that is not so popular in the United States. President Xi may think that international exchange through football could isolate the United States.
Some Hong Kong media outlets have argued that President Xi should be made the honorary chairman of the National Football Association to develop the sport.
The fact that football leads to the biggest sport economy is another reason for Xi’s love of the game. With more than 30 professional teams, China’s football league is already a bigger market than Korea’s. The total sum of the salaries of all football managers in the Korean football league is less than Guangzhou Evergrande Manager Marcello Lippi’s 13 billion won ($12.69 million) annual wage. China is making a long-term investment to make the Chinese league bigger than its European counterparts.
The Brazil World Cup is fast approaching. While it is not finalized, Xi is likely to visit Korea during the World Cup, and he is sure to make diplomatic remarks by mentioning the World Cup and the Korean team.
As Korea obsesses over advancing into the round of 16 and the quarterfinals, Xi will smoothly address pending issues between the two countries by using the football card that the United States cannot afford to use.
China is not playing in the World Cup, but President Xi has accepted the invitation of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and will attend the World Cup final match. His attendance is a part of Xi’s global strategy.
JoongAng Ilbo, May 31, Page 30
*The author is the Beijing bureau chief of the JoongAng Ilbo.
BY CHOI HYUNG-KYU

 

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Kee Koon Boon (“KB”) is the co-founder and director of HERO Investment Management which provides specialized fund management and investment advisory services to the ARCHEA Asia HERO Innovators Fund (www.heroinnovator.com), the only Asian SMID-cap tech-focused fund in the industry. KB is an internationally featured investor rooted in the principles of value investing for over a decade as a fund manager and analyst in the Asian capital markets who started his career at a boutique hedge fund in Singapore where he was with the firm since 2002 and was also part of the core investment committee in significantly outperforming the index in the 10-year-plus-old flagship Asian fund. He was also the portfolio manager for Asia-Pacific equities at Korea’s largest mutual fund company. Prior to setting up the H.E.R.O. Innovators Fund, KB was the Chief Investment Officer & CEO of a Singapore Registered Fund Management Company (RFMC) where he is responsible for listed Asian equity investments. KB had taught accounting at the Singapore Management University (SMU) as a faculty member and also pioneered the 15-week course on Accounting Fraud in Asia as an official module at SMU. KB remains grateful and honored to be invited by Singapore’s financial regulator Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to present to their top management team about implementing a world’s first fact-based forward-looking fraud detection framework to bring about benefits for the capital markets in Singapore and for the public and investment community. KB also served the community in sharing his insights in writing articles about value investing and corporate governance in the media that include Business Times, Straits Times, Jakarta Post, Manual of Ideas, Investopedia, TedXWallStreet. He had also presented in top investment, banking and finance conferences in America, Italy, Sydney, Cape Town, HK, China. He has trained CEOs, entrepreneurs, CFOs, management executives in business strategy & business model innovation in Singapore, HK and China.

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