Full-time, well-paid match officials would improve game, CFA says Impressed by China's national soccer reforms, the game's continental governing body - the Asian Football Confederation - pledged more support on Tuesday for the training of coaches and referees to help the country realize its soccer ambitions. As China rolls out a national blueprint to develop into a world soccer power, developments from grassroots promotion to league competition have intrigued Windsor John, the visiting general secretary of the confederation. "We are very pleased about the reforms that have taken place in China. The growth in attendance and popularity of the Chinese Super League is a very positive image for Asian football," said Windsor, who is on his first official visit to China since taking the helm in 2015. "The performance of the CSL clubs has become the benchmark for other clubs in Asia." Since the State Council, China's Cabinet, issued a soccer reform plan in early 2015, with the goal of becoming a strong soccer nation by 2050, investment in the league has surged and the level of competition has improved, highlighted by domestic champion club Guangzhou Evergrande's victories at the AFC Champions League in 2013 and 2015. Still, the lack of enough qualified coaches and relatively poor officiating have been taking a toll. Windsor said the confederation is prepared to help. "There are a lot of new programs we are talking about with the CFA," he said, referring to the Chinese Football Association. "One of these is referee training, which is critical to improving the standard of referees." Following a plan unveiled by the confederation last week to professionalize referees as early as next year, the confederation is prepared to send officiating experts for exchanges and training events in China on a more regular basis, Windsor said. Most of China's referees serving domestic leagues are part-time officials with jobs as college teachers or coaches. A system in which referees would work full-time - and with decent income and transparent assessments - would improve the quality of the game, said Huang Shiwei, spokeswoman of the CFA. A coaching convention with the CFA will be signed at the end of 2017 to authorize China to organize AFC-certificated coach training courses customized based on its own situation, Windsor said. "As you embark on a big plan through 2050, you need a lot of coaches. This convention comes at a good time for China to start producing top coaches on its own, not relying on AFC's programs," he said. [email protected]personalized rubber braceletschildren's id wristbands ukblack rubber wristbandswristband makerpac wristbandscustom silicone bandshen party wristbandswristband sportstyvek event wristbandscreate your own wristbandlogo wristbandsman city wristbandschildren's wristbandsplastic braceletslogo wristbands
Li Ming, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at DKU. PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY An artificial intelligence system jointly developed by the 3rd Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou and the Duke Kunshan University has achieved an 80 percent accuracy rate in screening 120 toddlers who were diagnosed with autism, the team behind the system said during a forum at DKU last week. The system represents a major development in autism screening for children, which is considered a challenge in China due to the lack of experienced pedestrians who can perform an accurate diagnosis. Experts say that early detection and intervention could substantially improve the prognosis of patients. China has more than 10 million children with autism. In the US, the estimated autism prevalence in 2018 is one in 59. It's quite hard for doctors to tell whether a two-year-old is autistic or not as there is no single cause for identification or a biomarker, said Zou Xiaobin, director of Child Behavior Development Center of the 3rd Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University. A diagnosis is completely reliant on a doctor's observation of the toddler's behavior. The AI system was tested on 120 two-year-olds between last year and early this year. The toddlers were accompanied by their mothers in a room and their behaviors were recorded and analyzed by audio and video systems. Eye-tracking technology was also used. Doctors said that unlike normal children, an autistic child lacks the ability to pay attention to people's eyes. A number of indicators were included in the system for the screening, said Li Ming, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at DKU who is responsible for the development of the AI system. The indicators include whether the toddlers responded by raising their heads or answering when they were called by their names, whether they gazed at their mothers or stood up to follow when their mothers left the room, and whether they made eye contact or followed their mothers' visual cues, Li said. Li said he was confident that the accuracy rate will be improved by at least 10 percent following upgrades to the machine learning system and data processing technology. Obtaining a bigger pool of samples is crucial as well. The more the machine learns, the higher its accuracy will be, Li said. Contact the writer at [email protected]
