Chinese Under-20 Soccer Team Follow Up
About a week ago I posted a short note about China's under-20 soccer team being denied entry to Canada. They had planned on attending a tournament hosted by the Vancouver Whitecaps soccer team. This week I was contacted by Bob Mackin Jr. a Vancouver based reporter. He offered an interesting follow up to the story. The following are his comments:
The Whitecaps appealed to the federal immigration minister and the problem was smoothed out. Or so they thought.A Chinese national team did make it into Canada, but it wasn't the under-20s -- who hope to play in Canada in the 2007 U-20 World Cup and will eventually be the Chinese U-23 Olympic team in 2008. The Chinese team that did play
Cardiff City FC (and lost 5-0) was actually the under-17 team. I told Vancouver Whitecaps officials who claim they are as surprised as I am.There has been no official communication made from the China Football Association or Vancouver Whitecaps regarding this matter. I interviewed the captain of the Chinese team after Friday's game and confirmed it's an
under-17 team. I'm trying to get more information about why the U-20 team didn't make it over.
I'm not willing to speculate as to why the under-17 team ended up where the under-20 team was expected to be, but if anyone else has useful speculation or information as to how the 'mix-up' came about please leave a comment. I would be interested to read more about it.
I have contacted the Chinese Football Association. If they shed any light on the matter I will share it here.
Update: You can read Bob Mackin's story on Slam Sports here: http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Soccer/Canada/2006/07/24/1699786-sun.html