On November 1, 2022, China's women's national soccer team drew with South Korea in the final round of the second stage of the Paris Olympics qualifying tournament, regretting that they did not qualify for the next stage of the tournament, and for the second time in the team's history they did not qualify for the Olympic Games. The day before the match between China and South Korea, the Beijing Normal University women's soccer team won the second FIFA Soccer World Cup Women's Soccer Championship by defeating Universidade Paulista of Brazil in a penalty kick shootout.
The loss of the Chinese women's soccer team in the Olympic qualifiers was sobering, while the victory of the BNU women's soccer team showed the outside world that the seeds of hope for the Chinese women's soccer team are still growing tenaciously.
Yu Fan: Playing soccer and studying are not contradictory.
Yu Fan, the captain of the NBSU women's soccer team and a member of the Beijing women's soccer team, has participated in two Big Sports Association World Cups. In an exclusive interview with a reporter from the New Beijing News, the 00-year-old girl emphasized the team's gains in this year's tournament, as well as a more important point - playing football and studying are not contradictory.
Yu Fan said that the NNU women's soccer team members come from different grades, including professional players and ordinary students. As professional players, they come back to school to train with the team when it's close to a game. What surprised her was the self-motivation of the "student teammates."" The difference between the varsity team and the sports team is that the sports team has more coaches and better facilities, while the varsity team only has Ms. Yan (Bi Yan) leading the training."
Yu Fan found that no one would be distracted and lazy during the training, and many female students from NNU would practice extra after training, specializing in passing, shooting and strength. She said, "I think human energy can be developed infinitely."
In Yu Fan's opinion, studying and playing soccer go hand in hand, "As your cultural level improves, your understanding of soccer will become deeper and deeper. Our school will offer courses in sports anatomy, sports physiology and sports training. By learning these theoretical knowledge, you will have a better understanding of the training content arranged by the coach. At the same time, you will also be able to understand your bodies better, so that when you have an injury or uncomfortable symptoms, you will know in time where the problem is, and you will be able to take some methods to alleviate the problem faster."
Playing soccer is equally conducive to learning, and there have been coaches who have argued that "children who are good at soccer must not be bad at learning either." Modern soccer is a complex and comprehensive sport that not only requires players to have good physical fitness on the field, but also a certain spatial sense and logical thinking ability, which will also help players when they return to their studies.
Yu Fan also intends to become a teacher or coach after retirement, so that more girls can contact, understand and devote themselves to women's soccer.
The Future of Women's College Soccer in China
Chinese college women's soccer has made progress and the overall level is slowly improving. Yu Fan, the captain of the women's soccer team of North Normal University, believes that the future development direction of Chinese college women's soccer should be "diversification" and "internationalization".
"Diversification" means that college women's soccer should attract more students from different backgrounds to join, including professional players, ordinary students, international students and so on. This will make the college women's soccer team more colorful and reserve more talents for the future of Chinese women's soccer.
"Internationalization" means that college women's soccer should strengthen cooperation with FIFA and actively participate in international tournaments. This will bring Chinese college women's soccer team in line with the world and improve the international competitiveness of the players.
Yu Fan said, "I hope that China's college women's soccer team can achieve greater results and contribute to the development of China's women's soccer."
