Chinese football numb after 'disastrous' 7-0 Japan defeat

President Xi Jinping once said he wanted China to host and even win the World Cup one day, but that ambition looked further away than ever after a chastening evening in Saitama on Thursday. China had only squeezed into the decisive third round of qualifying for the 2026 World Cup thanks to a superior head-to-head record over Thailand. China have reached the World Cup only once before, in 2002.

They are still alive in the group despite the desperate start, but Oriental Sports Daily said it was China's heaviest World Cup qualifying defeat. "When the taste of bitterness reaches its extreme, all that is left is numbness," it said.

The Paper in Shanghai said that Chinese football had hit "rock-bottom" and called it a "disastrous defeat". It partly pointed the finger at China's Croatian boss Branko Ivankovic, calling his "incompetence... a contributing factor to this crushing defeat".

The hammering in Saitama was hotly discussed on Chinese social media platform Weibo, with the hashtag "National team loses to Japan 0-7" viewed 480 million times as of Friday morning. "We still don't know what the Japanese goalkeeper looks like after a 90-minute game," said one user.

Another went as far as to call for the team to be "disbanded". "There is no point in spending the most money on this useless project." Writing on Weibo, former national team player Fan Zhiyi - who featured at the 2002 World Cup - said: "When there's a gap in ability and you lose, it's acceptable.

"What's hard for football fans to accept is losing like this." China will attempt to get their campaign back on track when they host Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.