Actually, there were many deeper grievances that were not convenient to discuss openly.
For example, when the influence of "Football Guru" was growing, some suggested that "Football Guru" could hype up some young players and promote them as the next Deng Kai or Wu Xudong.
That way, they could make a significant income through trading these players, or use their inflated valuations to balance accounts, or even place these players in certain special and important matches to achieve precise control over the score.
Of course, there were even more complex methods of use, essentially having "Football Guru" assist them in gray market dealings.
In the future, many people thought that the national team had been declining only after 2002. How could it not deteriorate over twenty years to this extent? How could it become so full of holes?
But actually, by 2002, fans had already started expressing such doubts.
By then, the domestic football scene had already become full of holes.
