Is Gong Luming's return another compromise?

Wen/Long Peipei

Yesterday afternoon, the Basketball Management Center announced the list of the new Chinese men's basketball coaching team. For a while, the entire circle of friends was wiped out by the notice, and everyone would leave a little sigh like "like" or "not easy" when forwarding it. When I forwarded the news on the client side, I wrote two words: Finally!

In the history of the Chinese men's basketball team, I'm afraid there is no time that the choice of head coach is as difficult to give birth as this year. In the past years, the national team will arrange players to resume training after the league enters the playoffs. This year, the Rio Olympic Games will start on August 5. Seeing that there is less than 4 months of preparation time left before the opening of the Olympic Games, the choice of head coach is finally settled. Although everyone was gratified by the return of director Gong, I was also extremely happy, but I still had to sweat for the men's basketball team when I was happy, because the problem left by this year's Olympic Games for director Gong was not simpler than that of leading the team to win the Asian Championships again last year.

During the national team's training preparation last year, during a chat with Director Gong, I first heard him talk about his personal and team problems that need to be solved by the basketball management center, but the latter has not come forward to solve them. The reasons for not being able to deal with them still sound good, such as following procedures, the eight central regulations and six prohibitions. In a word, a simple matter that seems to need the help of the organization to solve, but the process to be followed is extremely complex, to the extent that many problems that have existed since the 2014 Asian Games year have not been solved for a year, and no one is willing to solve them.

At the Changsha Asian Championships, the Chinese men's basketball team returned to the top of Asia with a total victory. At the press conference after winning the championship, I vigorously raised my hand to let the Indian press officer of the Asian Basketball Association give me the last chance to ask questions. I said a lot of foreshadowing, saying that it was Mr. Gong who brought the Chinese men's basketball team back to the right path. My question is whether he will take these guys to Rio with him in the 2016 Olympic Games.

As soon as I finished asking the question, I saw Ah Lian, who was sitting beside the palace guide, smiling. Maybe I thought this question was a bit superfluous. Some colleagues, who are not very common in front-line interviews, also laughed, as if they despised me for "it's no use asking!". But only some veteran journalists who have been running in the front line all the year round told me after the press conference that I had asked a good question.

Director Gong replied that if the organization needed him, he would go. But this sentence can also be heard in reverse. What if the organization doesn't say it needs to? However, my original intention of asking questions and my uneasiness at that time came true half a year later.

During the regular season, I met a guide Gong who came back to visit home in Jinan. At the half time of the game, I asked him if he had come to inspect the team members this time. He said no, I was stunned, and quickly asked if you would continue to take the men's basketball. Director Gong smiled meaningfully and did not answer, which made me uneasy in the second half of the game.

After the game, I continued to ask, and sure enough, it was the problems he had mentioned in his chat. A few months after the Asian Championships ended, he still didn't mention anything, which was completely unsolved. Even the fact that the men's basketball team won the Asian championship again didn't get the corresponding affirmation and encouragement. Whether to continue to lead the team under the guidance of Gong, no one in the Basketball Management Center has made a formal explanation to him.

For many things, he is the person who should be angry most, but he should comfort me, an outsider junior, not to be angry with the special mind of the elderly.

More than two months later, the semi-final began, when finally someone remembered the Chinese men's basketball team without rally signal. The problems between Gong Zhidao and the basketball management center have been disclosed little by little, and more and more people begin to pay attention to the leaderless Chinese men's basketball team. This is probably the first time that I have seen almost everyone stand in the same position to support a head coach who dares to say no to the Basketball Association in 11 years of employment, even the industry bigwigs who will speak out for the Basketball Association when something goes wrong in most cases.

This time, public opinion has become the "winner". Director Gong continues to hold the helm of the men's basketball coach. We have all waited for a most expected result. However, I put the words "winner" in quotation marks, because until now I am not sure whether the problems raised by Director Gong have been solved fairly. Still, he had to compromise again under the influence of public opinion.

When the dust settles, Gong Shuai returns, and the men's basketball team is about to leave for the plateau to resume training. I just hope that the negative worries in my heart this time are unfounded. I only hope that the final income of those who have done meritorious deeds can be equal to their efforts.