Aiming for higher goals

The Chinese men's national team retains a slim chance of making it to the 2026 World Cup Finals and has offered fans a glimmer of hope for a positive outcome. As sports fans relish China's athletic achievements after a remarkable Olympic year, the country's mediocre soccer program would hardly place high up on any honor rolls, with a series of setbacks and incidents, such as the men's squad's worst-ever Asian Cup outing and jail sentences for several former coaches and officials for corruption, all of which took a heavy toll on the sport's profile. The men's squad's remaining hope for making it to the 2026 World Cup Finals, though, has offered fans at least something to look forward to, despite the fact that it faces massive task to survive a tough group and qualify for the marquee FIFA tournament for only the second time since its solo appearance in 2002. Even with the team finishing the year languishing in 90th place in the FIFA world rankings, its worst position in a decade, Ivankovic has at least dug it out of the mire of 12 months ago, when the squad crashed out at the group stage of the 2024 Asian Cup in a frustrating goalless campaign — two draws and one loss — under former coach Aleksandar Jankovic.