When some soccer fans in Chonqing booed the Japanese team during its game with Jordan, sport stopped being a recreational contest between the best.

Across the sea in Japan, the boos and jeers were instantly amplified and interpreted as a show of Chinese nationalism - and more specifically - anti-Japan sentiment.

The anger percolated out of the media to the streets and into the political chambers.

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi appealed to the Chinese to separate sports from politics. Japanese officials of various ranks, along with the media, warned of the possible damage to state-to-state relations, and heaped blame on the Chinese Government for its alleged cultivation of "narrow-minded nationalism."'

"Chinese Government to blame for booing," shouted a Yomiuri Shimbun editorial.

Even diplomatic representations were made to Beijing.

Come on. It was just a game of soccer.

Passionate football fans around the world display extreme behaviour and act out of character when emotions run high, and are liable to be more so during matches against rivals.

The China Football Association has urged fans to practise restraint during this evening's China-Japan face-off at the Asian Cup soccer final. Organizers have decided to deploy more police officers within and around the Workers' Stadium venue, to enhance security. Chinese media are also calling on spectators to maintain self-discipline on the terraces .

That is all that can be done.

Boos may or may not be heard tonight around the pitch. Even if they do reverberate around the ground, we should all take it easy.

Since tonight's match is destined to be perceived as a hotchpotch of soccer and politics, we should just let it be.

I am not a fan of soccer, nor of Japan.

Still, I am anxious to know what happens tonight at the Workers' Stadium.

I have profound sympathy for Chinese soccer fans for their persistent sentimental attachment to a national men's soccer team which, until now at least, has been almost good for nothing.

Their loyalty to the disappointing national squad attests to an impressive breadth of mind.

The other night when I was routinely channel-flipping for TV documentaries, I was attracted by a scene at the Asian Cup. After a game in Chengdu, the Iraqi team raised a banner carrying "Thanks, Chengdu" in hand-written Chinese characters.

That was a touching display of gratitude to the generous cheers they received from local fans.

The abrupt face-change the Japanese team has encountered, however, was indeed a wild deviance from the generally hospitable atmosphere at the Asian Cup.

Whatever the reasons, it revealed an astonishing lack of sportsmanship.

As hosts of our continent's most prestigious soccer gala, we have on our shoulders a moral obligation to treat every guest team in a non-discriminative manner.

In such a sense, the boos at the Japanese team were unfair and mean.

They mar our traditional self-portrait as a hospitable nation.

It is politics at work, or more specific, a sign of public dislike of Japan, the Japanese media has observed.

This may be, depending on interpretation.

Booing is a way to make a statement.

Remember the boos that annoyed the Asian Football Federation Secretary-General?

By those boos, which turned out to be targeted at Yan Shiduo, vice-president of the Chinese Football Association, whose image happened to appear on the giant LCD panel in the stadium, fans expressed their anger at the gruesome status quo of Chinese soccer.

The boos the Japanese team heard, however, had more or less to do with their country's poor image in the eyes of the Chinese fans.

It is unfair. No doubt about it.

"What direct connection do players like Shunsuke Nakamura and Yuji Nakazawa have with the horrors inflicted on the Chinese during Japan's imperial days?" lamented a Daily Yomiuri Sportswriter. "The sad thing is that the young men...remain a symbol, in the eyes of many Chinese, of a nation that still has blood on its hands."

If those boos were an outcome of dislike or contempt of unrepentant Japanese politicians, they should not be piled on the innocent young soccer players. They should be received as envoys of friendship and goodwill, or at the very least, those of sportsmanship.

Like all others participating in the grand get-together of the Asian soccer family, they deserve our respect and hospitality.

That is a lesson all our fans should learn, and best they learn it before tonight's final.

That is a matter of courtesy.

But the Japanese have obviously elevated the spontaneous fans' behaviour to the level of government manipulation.

Describing "anti-Japan sentiment" as an "epidemic" in China, the Yomiuri Shimbun singled out the Chinese Government as the culprit. The high-profile Chinese celebration of the 50th anniversary of the victory of the War of Resistance against Japan (1937-45) was identified as an official propaganda campaign against Japan.

That is a very lame argument.

In the first place, it demonized and overestimated patriotic education in China. Beyond abstract calls for the public to love their motherland, the most recommended rituals of patriotism are basically national-flag raising and anthem singing.

The very same, if not more, is done in Japan, in similar manners.

Anything wrong with that?

Instead of adding fuel to the flames, the Chinese Government has always tried hard to contain the negative impacts of antagonism toward Japan so that bilateral ties do not flounder.

In public and in private, there are complaints about the authorities' being "soft" towards Japanese provocations.

When throngs of Japanese political members, following their Prime Minister, paid homage to the notorious Yasukuni Shrine, the Chinese public are reminded that they represented a mere minority of Japanese politicians.

When Japanese intercepted Chinese citizens who tried to reach the Diaoyu Islands, over which both China and Japan claim sovereignty, we are told to practise restraint so as not to derail bilateral ties.

More recently, at the Asian Cup, when journalists in Jinan noticed and protested against the Japanese misrepresentation of the country's mainland and Taiwan situation in a match programme, competent authorities appealed to the domestic media to take it as a technical mistake and not to make any fuss.

Is there anything else we can do to make the Japanese satisfied?

"The Chinese Government may be able to learn various lessons from the Asian Cup," said the Yomiuri Shimbun.

There is more for the Japanese to learn.

The Chongqing fans weren't booing without reason.

For more than five years since 1938, the city of Chongqing underwent extensive bombardments by the Japanese. Almost 12,000 people were killed and 14,000 injured.

As of today, no apology has been heard from Japan. Not to mention compensation.

Instead of squarely facing its past, the Japanese Government has resorted to distorting and obliterate it.

In Japanese textbooks, acts of aggression are beautified into benevolence of liberation.

Would you be so generous as to respect a liar?

The Japanese Government has repeatedly accused victims of Japanese war-time atrocities as dwelling in the past.

It never bothers to ask itself why Germany was pardoned and embraced by its past foes.

Japan is only one of the many countries who have committed war crimes on Chinese soil. China had military encounters with several neighbouring countries after its war against Japan. It seems weird, therefore, that there is no hatred in the Chinese public toward others.

Why is Japan different?

We know it. So do the Japanese.

When a soccer match is burdened with the unbearable heaviness of politics, it is not only sad, it is absurd.

But tonight at the stadium, at least, let us enjoy a break from politics.

Source: China Daily