China

The Chinese national football team (Chinese: 中国国家足球队), recognized as China PR by FIFA, is the national association football team of the People's Republic of China and is governed by the Chinese Football Association. The team is colloquially referred to as "Team China" (Chinese: 中国队), the "National Team" (Chinese: 国家队) or "Guózú" (Chinese: 国足, short for Chinese: 国家足球队; pinyin: Guójiā Zúqiú Duì; literally: "national football team"). The Chinese Football Association was founded in 1924 by the Republic of China and joined FIFA in 1931. Following the Chinese Civil War, the Football Association was reformed by the newly founded People's Republic of China. They remained affiliated with FIFA until 1958, when they withdrew, but they rejoined the organisation in 1979. China has won the EAFF East Asian Cup twice in 2005 and 2010 and have been runners-up at the AFC Asian Cup twice in 1984 and 2004. Although China failed to score a goal in their FIFA World Cup debut appearance during the 2002 FIFA World Cup, losing all their matches, qualifying for the tournament has been considered the greatest accomplishment in the country's football history. Although modern football lacks a distinguished history in China, there were an estimated 250 million viewers for the 2004 AFC Asian Cup Final, which China lost 3–1 to arch-rivals Japan, the largest single-event sports audience in the country's history at that time.