Football is gaining ground in China and now David Beckham has become the global ambassador for China in order to help manage the country’s image and reputation at the big game. The Chinese Super League is the name of the national team and it has recently been under a lot of scrutiny as players have left the team to join other brands instead. Didier Drogba is one high profile player who left, plus the group has suffered from a scandal about match fixing recently which certainly does not help its case.
At 37 years old, Beckham will help the team while still maintaining his day job playing for St-Germain in Paris. In a recent press event, he said that this was an important role for him, and that this was time for the country to help shape Chinese football in history. In this new role, he will help China set matches up and promote the team to children and others. He also says that there are a lot of potential football fans in China which need to discovery the sport with proper marketing efforts.
The Chinese team has had a hard time getting into matches recently, with Ivory Coast recently removing the China position in their matches for Turkish teams instead, a controversial move that China contested.
The recent player departures also did not help the team which may now be struggling to be able to participate in 2013 matches starting this month. Corruption has also been alleged in the Chinese Super League with many officials being banned by Fifa. Needless to say, Beckham may have his work cut out for him