"It is harsh to cut someone for not being able to qualify when the country originally could not qualify."
The Chinese Football Association (CFA) officially announced on the 27th through official channels that it had terminated the contract of coach Ivankovic and appointed coach Jurević as interim head coach of the men's national team.
On the 14th, the CFA dismissed coach Branko Ivanković after China failed to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup in North and Central America with a record of 3 wins and 7 losses, finishing 5th in the group. Jurević, who was reportedly slated to take the coaching position, will lead the Chinese national team during the East Asian Football Federation (EAFF) E-1 Championship.
The EAFF E-1 Championship will take place from July 7 to 16 in three cities in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea (Yongin, Suwon, Hwaseong). The men's matches will be held at Yongin Mir Stadium, and the women's matches will take place at Suwon World Cup Stadium and Hwaseong Comprehensive Sports Town. The South Korean men's national team will start with an opening match against China on the 7th, followed by matches against Hong Kong on the 11th and Japan on the 15th.
This decision is a direct result of the failure to qualify for the World Cup. China finished 5th in the Asian qualifying round for the 2026 North and Central America World Cup with a record of 3 wins and 7 losses. Coach Ivanković, who took office in February 2024, has had to resign. According to the contract terms, the coaching staff's contracts are automatically terminated if the national team fails to qualify for the World Cup, and the CFA formalized his dismissal accordingly.
Jurević, who will take on the interim head coach position, is of Serbian origin and previously played for teams such as OFK Beograd and AIK Solna. He has led various teams, including the Serbia U-17 national team and Pakhtakor Tashkent (Uzbekistan). Since March 2023, he has coached the Chinese Asian Games team, leading them to the quarterfinals for the first time in 17 years, and in January 2024, he led the China U-19 national team to qualify for the 2025 U-20 Asian Cup and achieve quarterfinal success.
As interim head coach, Jurević will gain experience leading the A national team during the East Asian Cup. The CFA plans to initiate the formal coaching search process after the tournament. The CFA noted, "We will simultaneously promote the process of appointing a new head coach for the national team to restructure it."
China will face South Korea, Japan, and Hong Kong in this East Asian Cup. With a transition period before the full implementation of the new coaching system, attention is focused on what impact Coach Jurević can leave.
The CFA added, "We deeply appreciate the dedication of coach Ivanković and the coaching staff, and we wish them success in their future endeavors."
Meanwhile, France's Le Figaro stated, "The coach of the Chinese national football team was dismissed for failing to qualify for the 2026 World Cup," adding, "However, this decision is puzzling. The ranking of the Chinese national football team is only 94th. Despite the population of 1.4 billion, they have never qualified for the tournament except for the 2002 Korea-Japan World Cup."
In fact, China's qualification for the Korea-Japan World Cup was merely a fluke due to Korea and Japan being co-hosts. They expected to qualify this time with 8.5 spots available, but they ended up failing even to qualify for the playoffs, being outperformed by Indonesia in the same group.
Le Figaro emphasized, "The dismissal of the Chinese national football team coach for failing to qualify for the World Cup is a harsh outcome. This is a country that has originally been unable to qualify. The only tournament they qualified for, the Korea-Japan World Cup, ended in misery without scoring goals or earning points." /mcadoo@soen.co.kr
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