China showed off its athletic prowess last year when it topped the medal table at the Olympics, so how come it can't produce a soccer team worth shouting for? It's a shame the country that arguably played the beautiful game first is represented by the China Super League, a source of mirth around the world.

There were so many on-field fights last season that China News Agency described the league's fixtures as Shaolin soccer and compared players to "martial arts heroes." Not surprisingly, perhaps, attendances and TV viewing figures declined. Meanwhile, the national team has a ranking of 104, just behind Ethiopia and Malawi - not exactly the sport's leading lights.

Fortunately, shanzhai soccer has come to the rescue. Literally translated as "mountain stronghold", shanzhai usually refers to fake products or clone culture. A shanzhai national team is therefore an alternative to the real thing, a virtual B team. It is being assembled in Suzhou in the belief that "1.3 billion Chinese people can certainly find 11 good footballers", according to the website daqi.com, which is behind the initiative. Netizens are being encouraged to recruit amateur players and there are plans to hold trials in the Jiangsu province city in the coming months.

Knock-offs may be cheaper but they are usually pale imitations of the originals and don't have any guarantees. This turned out to be the case with the highly anticipated shanzhai version of CCTV's Spring Festival Gala, which belly flopped so disastrously it may never get up again.

According to Danwei coverage, based on interviews with New Culture View, the show was not broadcast live (as promised) because its partners pulled out. The hotel hosting the production allegedly got cold feet and kicked out the crew and performers on Lunar New Year Eve, who ended up doing their acts in a Beijing bathhouse. Apparently they didn't even get massages for their pains.

In contrast, the real CCTV Spring Festival Gala went ahead without a hitch. Though the look-alike ethnic dances were tiresome and some of the comedy routines dragged on, Jay Chou's rap duet with diva Song Zuying was a surprising hit, magician Louis Liu made waves, while the breakout performance of comedian Xiao Shenyang (pictured right), with master Zhao Benshan, was a revelation.

Earlier this week, Xiao Shenyang collected top prize for the "most popular language program at CCTV's 2009 Spring Festival Gala", along with female comedian Mao Mao and Zhao.

Xiao Shenyang accepted his award with a short speech: "I feel pretty good. That's it." He then did an emotional rendition of the song Big Sea that ended with him falling to his knees and kowtowing to the audience, provoking big laughs. A star is born.

(China Daily February 12, 2009)