In what is being hailed as one of the greatest comeback stories of all time, a Guangzhou football coach delivered a halftime speech said to rival Martin Luther King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ last week, inspiring his Under 11s youth team to overcome a 2-1 deficit, eventually winning the game with a final score of 25-2.
Except this isn't the Mighty Ducks and that is not exactly how - or why - it happened. We live in a world where notions of fair play lay in tatters at the feet of corrupt FIFA officials, Lance Armstrong and doping Russian Olympians.
READ MORE: Corruption in the Chinese Super League
What really went down was two Guangzhou teams, determined to keep a youth tournament trophy in the region, conspired to help DongShanXiaoYe attain the 17 goals needed to finish the season ahead of rivals Qingmaio, from Shunde, after they won a game 31-0.
The losers, Tikitaka, were deliberately shooting goals into their own net and the display has resulted in coaches and parents being reprimanded and the tournament organizer receiving a three-year ban by the Guangzhou Football Association.
Some commentators have pointed out the incident doesn’t bode well for the future of China’s national team, which recently suffered an embarrassing defeat at the hands of Syria. When match-fixing has trickled down to the grassroots level, serious questions are raised about the efficiency of domestic efforts to eradicate corruption in the sport.
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