Chinese men's soccer team take a beating in Oman

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Yin named as caretaker coach of Chinese national team

(Shanghai Daily)
Updated: 2008-12-19 17:27

Chinese media and soccer fans flayed the national men's team after new coach Yin Tiesheng took the injury-depleted side to a demoralizing 1-3 loss in a friendly against Oman.

Chinese fans have endured a miserable year, with the Olympic side knocked out of the group stages of the Beijing Games in August and the national side earlier bundled out of preliminaries for the 2010 World Cup finals.

The loss to Oman on Wednesday night in Muscat continued China's abysmal form and left the team ranked 100th in the world, its second lowest place ever.

"A most embarrassing beginning," moaned the headline of yesterday's Soccer News, which said Yin's debut was the worst of seven coaches appointed since 1992.

"One more humiliation for Chinese football," the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper said of China's first top-line defeat by the Gulf state.

Newspapers gave short shrift to substitute Qu Bo's second-half equalizer, focusing more on the young side's leaky defense. "Thanks to good luck, (Oman) only scored three times," the Beijing News said.

Yin, who was named temporary head coach last week, put on a brave face after the match and said he was happy with his players' morale.

"My ultimate goal is attached to January's two Asian Cup qualifiers. Before that these matches are just warm-ups," he told Soccer News.

China plays Iran today in a second warm-up match before Asian Cup qualifiers in January.

Women beaten too

In Detroit, Heather O'Reilly scored off a rebound in the 34th minute to help the United States women beat China 1-0 in an international friendly on Wednesday.

Lindsay Tarpley helped put the U.S. ahead when her looping shot hit the crossbar and O'Reilly tapped home the rebound at Ford Field for her 25th international goal.

China nearly equalized before halftime, but American goalkeeper Hope Solo deflected Wang Dandan's shot and was able to grab the loose ball before it could bounce over the line.

Both teams had good scoring chances in the second half. Zhang Yanru made a diving save of Amy Rodriguez's shot in the 63rd minute, and reserve goalkeeper Nicole Barnhart made an easy stop 9 minutes later when Han Duan broke in alone on the U.S. goal. Xu Yuan had China's last chance, but her diving header went wide with 3 minutes left.