體壇英語資訊：Glimpse of hope for China to book Olympic womens soccer berth

?It will be a difficult task for the Chinese women's soccer team to secure a berth of the 2024 London Olympic Games, as only two slots were allocated to Asia, but they are not hopeless.

The performance of the Chinese team at the four-nation tourney made the home crowd saw a glimmer of hope.

"We made some improvement after the Asian Games," said Li Xiaopeng, coach of the Chinese women's team. "I'm satisfied with the performance."

China, standing 11th in the FIFA ranking, finished the third in the tournament, while the U.S. team won the title and Canada took the second.

China lost to world No. 1 the United States 2-0 on Tuesday. They came from behind to beat world No. 4 Sweden 2-1 on Sunday and lost to world No. 9 Canada 3-2 last Friday.

"We have no advantage when playing with world top 10 teams," said Li. "So the results were quite normal."

As the weakest team in the tourney, China's performance did not disappoint the home crowd and actually, compared with two months ago in the Asiad, they seemed like a brand new team by showing obvious progress in their attacks and team work.

The most important thing is the team now has a more positive mental outlook than in the Asian Games.

"Although we lost the game, there are some bright sides," said Li. "The players were not nervous when we were behind and they played aggressively, though still not aggressively enough."

Li took the charge of the team in last August after the "steel roses" failed to qualify for the World Cup in Germany for the first time and former coach Shang Ruihua resigned.

Although Li made several changes, the Chinese team, once the Olympic silver medallists and the World Cup runners-up, still missed out on a podium finish for the first time in the Asian Games.

The poor results made the chance of an Olympics berth once seemed nearly impossible as China has to face arch rivals Japan, South Korea and DPR Korea for only two tickets.

But this time at the four-nation tourney, China showed signs of revival. And an Olympic berth might not be that hard for the new team.

The 35-year-old coach gave many chances to young players. Among the Chinese team, three are under the age of 20, and the oldest player is only 26. The young players have big potentials.

"I need to know all the players," Li said. "I can't count on just one or two players because I don't know what will happen before September. The Olympic qualifiers has 15 matches and it will be very tough, maybe some players will get injured."

The Chinese team also improved a lot in attacks, and former Chinese men's national team forward Li Jinyu helped much in that. He joined the team as the assistant coach in January and especially took charge of the training of the strikers.

"Li Jinyu's arrival is no doubt a big help to us," said Li Xiaopeng. "Our strikers made a lot of progress."

However, the young team still have lots of weakness. They made too many mistakes during the match and are lack of strength and experience.

Luckily they still have time. According to Li, the squad for the London Olympics qualifiers will not be decided until May, and the coach and the players have confidence.

"I still have half a year to build up the team," Li said. "We will be more aggressive and make some improvement in defense and speed."

?It will be a difficult task for the Chinese women's soccer team to secure a berth of the 2024 London Olympic Games, as only two slots were allocated to Asia, but they are not hopeless.

The performance of the Chinese team at the four-nation tourney made the home crowd saw a glimmer of hope.

"We made some improvement after the Asian Games," said Li Xiaopeng, coach of the Chinese women's team. "I'm satisfied with the performance."

China, standing 11th in the FIFA ranking, finished the third in the tournament, while the U.S. team won the title and Canada took the second.

China lost to world No. 1 the United States 2-0 on Tuesday. They came from behind to beat world No. 4 Sweden 2-1 on Sunday and lost to world No. 9 Canada 3-2 last Friday.

"We have no advantage when playing with world top 10 teams," said Li. "So the results were quite normal."

As the weakest team in the tourney, China's performance did not disappoint the home crowd and actually, compared with two months ago in the Asiad, they seemed like a brand new team by showing obvious progress in their attacks and team work.

The most important thing is the team now has a more positive mental outlook than in the Asian Games.

"Although we lost the game, there are some bright sides," said Li. "The players were not nervous when we were behind and they played aggressively, though still not aggressively enough."

Li took the charge of the team in last August after the "steel roses" failed to qualify for the World Cup in Germany for the first time and former coach Shang Ruihua resigned.

Although Li made several changes, the Chinese team, once the Olympic silver medallists and the World Cup runners-up, still missed out on a podium finish for the first time in the Asian Games.

The poor results made the chance of an Olympics berth once seemed nearly impossible as China has to face arch rivals Japan, South Korea and DPR Korea for only two tickets.

But this time at the four-nation tourney, China showed signs of revival. And an Olympic berth might not be that hard for the new team.

The 35-year-old coach gave many chances to young players. Among the Chinese team, three are under the age of 20, and the oldest player is only 26. The young players have big potentials.

"I need to know all the players," Li said. "I can't count on just one or two players because I don't know what will happen before September. The Olympic qualifiers has 15 matches and it will be very tough, maybe some players will get injured."

The Chinese team also improved a lot in attacks, and former Chinese men's national team forward Li Jinyu helped much in that. He joined the team as the assistant coach in January and especially took charge of the training of the strikers.

"Li Jinyu's arrival is no doubt a big help to us," said Li Xiaopeng. "Our strikers made a lot of progress."

However, the young team still have lots of weakness. They made too many mistakes during the match and are lack of strength and experience.

Luckily they still have time. According to Li, the squad for the London Olympics qualifiers will not be decided until May, and the coach and the players have confidence.

"I still have half a year to build up the team," Li said. "We will be more aggressive and make some improvement in defense and speed."