Commentary: Let power of football give wings to Chinese dream

By adopting a comprehensive football reform plan recently, the Chinese government starts to make efforts to realize Chinese President Xi Jinping's three wishes: China's World Cup qualification, hosting of the World Cup and winning the World Cup. What is even more noteworthy, the Chinese are also aiming at something beyond football, something spiritual.

Why the fuss? People may ask. Who says football is just a game where 22 human beings chase a ball around should just look at what football as well as a systematic reform have done to Germany.

Remember these moments after the game? Germany had beaten Brazil 7-1 at the 2014 World Cup at Belo Horizonte. And what did you see on the pitch? No wild celebrating German players. No gestures of disrespect. No, they were talking to their Brazilian opponents and giving them words of comfort. Later you found as many articles about their behavior as you did about the memorable game.

The entire nation was proud of the behavior. You could read it in the faces of people on the street. It was pride of 11 young people working together as a real team. It might have been the message: There's nothing bad about winning and beating your opponent, but no less important is the way one does it.

The episode shows how much a football team's performance can affect an entire nation's confidence and standing. Germany had won football games before the one in Brazil. But this time, it was different. And the whole world was amazed.

What happened that day in Brazil might just be a little episode in the long story of German football. What mainly behind it is a fundamental change in German football culture as far as team-building and education are concerned.

With the start of the 2001/2002 season, a 10-year plan was implemented to restructure football coaching in Germany. From then on football clubs opened special academies where sport and school life was combined with clubs employing teachers and other instructors. Germany's football officials had to face the fact that young people were becoming more and more attracted by others sports.

Many things had been done in German football before, to such an extent that football has been a part of physical education at schools for decades now, but this time it seemed to be more a nationwide matter, an effort where everybody was involved. And in 2014 the entire nation felt like world champions. A feeling many called the nation-wide "feel-good factor".

Football is a team sport. It is something that attracts people, maybe the most. At the same time, it contains a lot character-building aspects you need in normal life too. Making your own decisions but making them with the interests of your teammates and team in mind was vital. It is about strategy and a group that, putting in the greatest possible effort, tries to achieve a goal - something that happens in real life.

To be successful in football and at school was nothing unrealistic anymore. Football was something that could lead young people into a sound way into life - in sports, society and the working world. To finish studies or career training, for a life after football, was just as important as scoring goals. There was teamwork, rules concerning food and drink and living one's life together with others in a kind of community (football-academy).

With the new football reform, the Chinese now are doing something similar, including creating the much-needed infrastructure like more campus pitches to give youngsters more opportunities to play football, love football and be nurtured by a healthy football culture.

Not only as regards the amount of people but also considering the experience it has in sports in general, China's plans to develop football can lead to a change in China's sports scene as the people's interest in football is growing.

There might be doubts that a major tournament has a positive effect on a country's economy. But it certainly changes people's mood.

When it comes to more fundamental German changes two events stand out. The "Miracle of Bern" of the 1954 World Cup, when the war-torn and isolated Germany was catapulted back into the world's community as millions of Germans had the feeling of belonging again. Some historians call July 4, 1954 the "true birthday" of the young Federal Republic of Germany.

A not less important change took place in 2006 when millions of Germans made what was until then a hidden commitment to their country. For decades, it had not been the done thing to show much patriotism as it was always linked to Germany's darkest hours of the Nazi dictatorship and the Holocaust. In 2006, not only young people opened their hearts and waved German flags. Being German was acceptable without second thoughts. Billions around the world radically changed their views about the Germans.

Many asked: "What's happened to the Germans?" And many had to abandon their long-held prejudices. The World Cup in Germany, the so called "Summer Fairy-tale", was a giant PR-campaign nobody could have ever paid for. It spread an authentic picture of a modern and open country around the world.

Returning to China, the new football reform plan points into the right direction. China is not regarded as a football nation yet and has a long way to go. But the country's sports potential is enormous, especially as young people are sports-mad and there is a generally high level of interest among the Chinese population.

It can only mean football will get more and more popular in China and lead to the world's top. To be successful in the end it is vital to start playing football in schools and to set up strict standards as far as league football (from the top to the bottom), coaches and managers are concerned.

And by the way: Wasn't it China football once born? It is time to achieve a renaissance by getting back to the roots (of Cuju). Endi