Sports

Independent icons

By Lei Lei (China Daily)
Updated: 2011-06-01 08:30

Left: Citizens participate in a long-distance run to celebrate the Asian Games in Beijing in May 1990. Right: Yao Ming, renowned Chinese basketball player, plays with children from Fuyang, Anhui province at Shanghai Institute of Physical Education on July 8, 2007. Those children became orphans after their parents died from AIDS. Left: Yang Shizhong / China Daily; right: Gao Erqiang / China Daily

Looking back at 30 years of sports in China, it is easy to see how the times have changed. From a generation of sportspersons who were solely dependent on State support and had to toil hard to make an impact on the global stage, China has a new generation of confident young sport professionals who have not only made a name for themselves but are proving to be excellent brand ambassadors for the country.

Seeds of that tumultuous journey were sown in November 1981 when the Chinese women's volleyball team upstaged several well-known nations to wrest the World Cup for the first time. That was the beginning of a five-year reign at the top for the team led by "Iron Hammer" spiker Lang Ping.

Such was the euphoria of that victory that the winners were considered icons for the whole nation and proclaimed a symbol of success for the whole-nation support system for sport. Selected by sports schools at an early age, most of the full-time athletes were supported by the government financially.

But for today's generation, Lang is not the only sports icon. For them it is more likely to be sportspersons like basketball star Yao Ming, tennis champion Li Na or ace hurdler Liu Xiang. What makes the present crop of sportspersons different from their predecessors is that they are all more international, more professional and more independent and do not depend on State support.

"When we returned home, no matter where we went, we were welcomed with flowers, as our fighting spirit inspired the young generation at that time," says Lang. "I think it was not just the gold medals, it was an encouragement for people at that time, just when China was taking the first steps toward opening-up."

After its scintillating performance in volleyball, China dazzled the world when it bagged all the seven major titles at the 36th Table Tennis World Championships in 1981. Gymnastics was another discipline in which China excelled when Li Ning won six gold medals out of the total of seven at the sixth Gymnastics World Championships in 1982. In November that year, at the ninth Asian Games in New Delhi, China topped the medal tally for the first time by winning 61 gold, 51 silver and 41 bronze medals. Since then the country has dominated the Asian Games. At the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games, Xu Haifeng won the first Olympic gold for China in shooting, a milestone for the country's sport.

Winning competitions was not the only way China established itself on the global sporting map in the 1980s. The nation also took center stage by winning seats in important sporting bodies.

The 1990s saw the nation successfully host the Asian Games in Beijing, and retaining its lead at the top with 183 gold, 107 silver and 52 bronze medals.

Rapid strides were also made during that period in disciplines like swimming and athletics.

However, if there is one athlete who is representative of the 1990s, that would undoubtedly be the iconic table tennis player Deng Yaping. In a sporting career spanning two decades, Deng won more titles than any other paddler of her time.

When she retired from the sport in 1997, she had four Olympic golds and 18 world championship titles under her belt.

Professionalism in sports had a relatively subdued birth in China during 1992 with soccer. With its national team often earning the sobriquet of whipping boys, morale was at an all-time low. It was around the time that sports authorities decided to take the first steps to make soccer professional.

On April 7, 1994, the first Chinese soccer league, which featured 14 clubs, started in Chengdu, Sichuan province. The professional league system was later expanded to other sports like basketball, volleyball, table tennis and badminton.

"Table tennis started seeking market support from 1995," says Cai Zhenhua, former head coach of the national table tennis team and current deputy sports minister.

The seeds of professionalism sown in the early 1990s finally began to bear fruit toward the turn of the century. In June 1999, basketball player Wang Zhizhi was drafted by NBA team Dallas Mavericks, and became the first Chinese to compete in the world's top league.

Since then, several Chinese basketball players have started to make a mark for themselves in the NBA, with Houston Rockets Yao leading the pack. Chinese athletes are now striking forth and making the world their own and that too without any support from the State.

No other sport has gained from professionalism like tennis. Since 2008, four Chinese women tennis players, including 2011 Australian Open runner-up Li Na and 2006 Australian Open doubles champion Zheng Jie, have been allowed to manage their own careers by China's traditionally ultra-protective sports authorities.

The China promotion video shown at Times Square in New York earlier this year features five sports stars, including women's volleyball icon Lang, table tennis queen Deng, NBA all-star center Yao and snooker ace Ding Junhui. They are not only professional sportspersons, but also role models for a new generation.

"Our success is backed up by the whole society," says Yao.

"Before the opening-up, the old generation had no chance to go abroad. After I went to the US in 2002, more and more people in the US know about Chinese culture," he says.

(China Daily 06/01/2011 page58)