52. Face

The notion of Face in China was drilled into us from the very start. Chinese people especially men, will never back down from a situation as their own dignity, pride and reputation amongst their peers will take a hit if they do. So if it ever comes to it back down before something kicks off.

However I had not really seen this concept in the flesh, which is surprising given that it was supposed to have originated in China. The country has a large amount of words to describe different forms of Face (Wikipedia) showing its prevalence in society.

This wasn’t till last night when it all kicked off.

Since March, every Monday night has involved a group of us partaking in a 7-a-side football league. The social but also physically exerting event has been great for general banter outside of work.

However it hasn’t been so successful on the football side of things.

In fact we hadn’t won a match in a while. Our opposition last night a Chinese team, ‘the Flying Seven’ in our league looked on paper and current form to continue that streak.

I’d say we are the Millwall or Leeds of the league our English style is treated with scorn and Sean made an effort with the ref before the game that anything said to him during the game is only out of passion.

We are a decent outfit, its just the last 15 minutes where we concede late goals and lose the tight games. With a look at the two benches, it looked like that trend might continue.

Whilst the Chinese team had a William sister-esqe Entourage with WAGS, an actual coach and enough substitutes to run us ragged, our bench was empty as we waited for Raf our 6ft4 Trinidadian superstar to turn up.

The game kicked off. We had a 3-2-1 formation with myself playing the lone man up front. I think they had a similar formation. Their three men at the back weren’t the typical Chinese, these guys were built, were fast and good on the ball.

They had a set game plan of regimented passing and keeping set positions around the field. 10 minutes in the ball popped to their no 9 from an attempted clearance, he struck it clean and into the bottom left, 1-0.

We responded well. Upping the tempo. Unsettling their defenders who were giving some added attention. As well as physicality in the tackle, the right back was wrapping his arms around me like I was going away for a year. I pushed said guy off as he embraced me on the half way.  He blurted out the obscenities he wouldn’t have been taught in a Shane English class. Forgetting the previously stated lesson from earlier I stood my ground, this caused uproar, players were flying in, the referee arrived to break it up.

He clearly acknowledged his country man was the aggressor but told me simply to ‘Remember Chinese custom’.

Tempers had flared. Tackles were becoming later and shouts were becoming fiercer. We won a free-kick, Darren capitalised and knocked it round the wall and past the keeper.

We continued this momentum and having missed two opportunities to put us ahead, I rose to meet a Sean cross, the ball flying into the top right. We’d gone 1 up and it stayed that way to the half time.

Second half, their coach made some changes bringing on one clear psycho who would react to anything.

Needless to say he didn’t react well to us going 3-1 up via a Sean cleanly hit strike from an indirect freekick.

Incidents on the field were greeted with this no 2 who would run in thinking we’d insulted everyone of his family. Darren received an elbow to the head, but worst came when this hot head cleared his gob of spit on me. I’d amazingly learnt a lesson and didn’t react, still no card given as the ref spoke to the spitter.

After minutes of following passes back and forth and starved of possession we conceded a late goal. But with minutes left it was too late for the Chinese outfit.

This didn’t settle with their bench, when on the final whistle, their bench ran on and threw a chair at Darren who had cheered the result. In the fracas they bellowed out ‘THIS IS CHINA’ as well as the worst type of Chinese profanities that our resident bilingual translated for us.

The escalation that had happened throughout the match culminating in the pitch being stormed was Chinese Face being questioned.

The league is very international, with team players from literally all over the world. Yes this is China, but this is also football.