If it's a sickness, what are his remedies, what medicine would Perry prescribe to cure China's lack of a healthy football sector?

"Use the Chinese market and Asian brands to develop global football in Asia, and in China," he said. "China needs to think in terms of much bigger ideas to create the road to being a major football force. The long term aim should be to take the top players to play for the whole season in Asia. Then a global league would develop that would be similar to American football with continental leagues."

He went on, "When China carried out research into any major industry it developed short, medium and long term plans. So in football do not take short term steps that will result in short term results. China needs to think much bigger ideas to create the road to being a major soccer force."

Perry also reminded me that the world's best players can play anywhere in the world. It all depends upon platforms. So China should have such a platform.

Perry's vision and strategy as a businessman did not set in until two years later. On April 12, 2016, China's national drive on football development was endorsed by a newly-issued plan, aiming at entering the football "elite club" and making a realistic goal of China becoming a top class football nation by 2050.

Covering a long-time span of 2016-2050, the 14-page "Medium and Long-Term Plan of Chinese Football Development" outlined a multi-decade vision of the sport's progress in the country, and set up a number of pragmatic measures to attain the goal.

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