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In a small city thousands of kilometres inland from China's major centres, a football revolution is underway.
The town of Zhidan, in central-western Shaanxi province, is an unlikely starting point for one of the most ambitious plans in the history of sport.
China's Government-run football association is in the early stages of a multi-billion-dollar program to make the country a World Cup-winning soccer powerhouse.
"Chinese soccer lacks players at the base of the pyramid," local football association head at Zhidan, population 160,000, Ding Changbao said.
"There aren't enough young people playing soccer in China, due to a lack of space in the big cities and academic pressure."
Mr Ding has become an unlikely trailblazer for the country's newfound passion for the sport.
He established a dirt field soccer academy in Zhidan 15 years ago, which has now developed into a coaching program that gained the endorsement of the country's President Xi Jinping.
It has been seen as a model for a plan to establish 50,000 coaching schools across the country within a decade, with a goal of having 50 million competent players — men and women — by the turn of the century.
"Many parents are now rushing to soccer because they want their children to become stars," he said.
The lure of the beautiful game has increased, with Chinese clubs forking out enormous sums to snare top international talent.
During the most recent transfer window, Shanghai SIPG bought Chelsea midfielder Oscar on an $84 million transfer fee.
The state-owned club also bought ageing Argentine star Carlos Tevez in a deal reportedly worth $45 million.
It came after a series of high profile transfers in the past two seasons that catapulted Chinese clubs to the top of world football's money list.
"Obviously some amounts of money getting thrown around seem ridiculous, but at the same time, if you want to get your name out to the public, especially in Europe, it's what's necessary," Socceroo defender contracted to Nanjing-based Jiangsu Suning Trent Sainsbury said.
The 25-year-old is now on loan to super club Inter Milan — a move made possible by electronics conglomerate Suning buying the Italian club last year in a $380-million deal.
"There is no budget — Club owners can spend as much money as they please for players and get the best talent," he said.
The huge amounts being spent by Chinese clubs earned a Government rebuke earlier this year, with authorities warning against "irrational spending".
"I don't want to see so much money spent on players in the top teams, because there are many weaknesses in Chinese football," Nanjing-based football journalist Wu Hao said.
"For example, many students have no football classes at school — children in some poor areas don't even have enough money to buy a pair of football boots."
But the spending is set to continue, with the official blueprint calling for China to host and win a World Cup by 2050 — an ambitious goal given that China's men's team has only ever qualified once.
A loss last week to Iran in Tehran all but ended China's chances of making the next World Cup in Russia next year.
But with so much money and pressure now in the Chinese game, fans have high expectations that they will improve soon.
Watch Foreign Correspondent's story The Big Goal at 9:30pm Tuesday April 4 and 10:30am Thursday April 6 on ABC TV, 6:30pm Sunday April 9 on News 24, or on ABC iView.
First posted