Soccer defeat prompts crisis talks

Senior soccer coaches and top officials were called together Wednesday in a closed meeting to discuss the crisis in the Chinese game, following a humiliating loss to Thailand in a friendly match at the weekend.

In a rare move, the General Administration of Sport of China (GASC) called for discussions into the parlous state of the national game, and also into whether highly-paid Spanish coach José Antonio Camacho should be fired, and who should foot the bill to pay him off, Beijing Youth Daily reported Wednesday.

China lost 1:5 to a second-string Thai squad on Saturday in Hefei, Anhui Province.

While the Chinese men's football squad has been in decline for a long time, this emergency meeting signals that sport authorities are  concerned about the national squad's current situation. Along with officials, senior coaches from different provinces and Chinese coaches from the national team attended the meeting, while Camacho and other foreign staff did not.

Up to now, GASC officials have rarely intervened with the Chinese Football Association (CFA), but this latest defeat has led to much public condemnation of the team, the coach and his enormous salary.

Camacho earns 2.8 million euros ($3.75 million) annually, with a further 1.5 million euros for his assistants. The Chinese side also foots the enormous income tax bill.

When the CFA signed the contract with Camacho in 2010, officials overlooked that his high salary was after tax, meaning they should also pay the 3.5 million euros tax bill.

Wang Dazhao, a sports commentator with the People's Daily, told the Global Times that Camacho should quit and take the blame for such a humiliating loss, but the CFA might pay high fees to break the contract.

It will take 7.26 million euros to buy Camacho out of his contract, the Beijing News reported.

"Taxes should be sorted out very clearly when you're hiring a coach, even if you're an administrative official. We (the CFA) did a lot of irregular things, and they had the power to do them," Wang said.

While condemning the team's defeat, public reaction to the crisis meeting mainly focused on whether Camacho should be fired or not.

The administrative power accorded to the CFA makes Chinese soccer abnormal, said Zhao Jisheng, a professor with the College of PE and Sports at Beijing Normal University. 

 Chinese soccer is commercialized but still governed by the CFA, which is supposed to be a self-disciplining organization to oversee its members in the sport, and should not have so much power.

"GASC should be the supervisor, but on many occasions, the CFA has taken the place of the administration," Zhao said.

"Even though the administration has intervened this time and held meetings, I don't think it will change the situation that much," he noted.