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Comment by CodeSheikh | Hacker News Reader

This is not specific to China but many larger countries who are good at other sports but they don't do well at soccer. Australia is very good at Rugby, Cricket but their soccer team is average and they make it to world cups only because of limited competition in their confederation (OFC). Domestic soccer leagues are just picking up in China. They mostly comprise to Chinese players and/or end up with retirees of European clubs (Retired Andre Iniesta of Barcelona/Spain moving to some club in China).

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Iniesta moved to Japan.

Also, Australia has 5200% less people than China, so not a great comparison. A better comparison would have been India, who have a comparable population but a heavy focus on cricket.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/23/football/barcelona-iniesta-ja...

That's similar to the US. I think a lot of it just comes down to the number of kids that grow up playing a sport i.e. the talent pool. In the US lots of kids try playing soccer but most focus more on baseball / basketball / football / hockey. Whereas in countries where soccer is the main sport the talent pool is larger and you have tons of talented kids who've been playing for two decades

Yet, the US dominates in women’s soccer. Maybe there are fewer options for them to play other sports (football specifically)?

The US actually has a fairly good men's national team. As weak as CONCACAF is, there's a reason why they've qualified for seven of the last eight World Cups - and why their tie with Trinidad and Tobago was so surprising.

Currently 25th in FIFA rankings (3rd in CONCACAF). Is there any other major men's sport where the US ranks outside the top 20 (maybe cricket)?

- 15th in rugby https://www.worldrugby.org/rankings/mru?lang=en

- 6th in tennis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITF_Rankings#Men

- 4th in hockey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IIHF_World_Ranking

- 2nd in volleyball https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIVB_World_Rankings

What we in the UK call hockey (field hockey) - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIH_World_Rankings - USA women 7th, USA men not listed.

You are correct. I see them at 26th here - http://www.fih.ch/rankings/outdoor/

Another one would be handball, ranked 38th - http://www.ihf.info/en-us/thegame/rankingtable.aspx?month=7&...

Where is handball a major sport; I don't think I've ever seen it played in a match.

The number of women playing sports seriously is much higher in the US than in most other countries due to Title IX and cultural reasons.

Another reason might be that in Europe soccer is considered a rather masculine sport. Very few girls even consider playing it. Girls usually play volleyball, handball, etc. but a girl that kicks the ball with a foot would be strangely looked at here.

In the US, I hear, soccer is reasonably popular as a female sport, so the talenf pool is larger.

Soccer also doesn’t compete with football or basketball for girls like it does with boys

Nitpick: Australia is in the Asian confederation, not Oceana. Still, Asia as a whole is a weak confederation.

That's not even a minor nitpick - the AFC is much more competitive. Not quite the level of UEFA or CONMEBOL but the latter stages have plenty of potential banana skins and qualification is by no means guaranteed. Indeed Australia were narrowly edged by France a few days back and today drew with Denmark - both well regarded UEFA nations. They're genuinely a decent side.

Yeah, but they've only been there for 12 years. OFC before then.

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