With a tied score and two minutes left to play after a stunning second-half comeback, China’s women’s soccer team finally scored the goal that had eluded them for 16 years.
That winning goal, which earned the team their first AFC Asian Cup since 2006, reverberated across the country. Fans who’d long been left hungry for glory from a mens or womens national team scrawled exuberant posts on social media, and at least one prominent sportscaster admitting to crying tears of joy.
Eighteen months later, that win also landed the team at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand, where the team and its coach Shui Qingxia have a chance to show that was just the opening shot in China’s rise to reclaim its place as a dominant force in the women’s sport.