When an exciting new basketball talent emerges in China, numbers tend to become part of his identity. With the mention of his name you'll likely hear his height, shoe size, chest width, scoring average, and number of rebounds, assists and slam dunks he picks up in a game. It all sounds very scientific, until you ask what you might think would be a fairly straightforward question: how old is he? To that, there's generally no short answer. For example, Guangdong Tigers' 2.12-metre star Yi Jianlian is officially listed as being born on October 27, 1987, meaning he will turn 19 this year. But conflicting documents and reports, not to mention several basketball experts, say he is either 21 or 22. To a hot basketball talent the difference is critical as China will not let any of its young stars play in the NBA before they are at least 22, in part as a paternalistic protection method, and in part a mechanism to ensure the domestic clubs get a few good years out of their best players before they head for greener pastures. But age-rigging is rampant in Chinese sporting circles, and the confusion is compounded by the fact the athletes' age can be adjusted both ways, sometimes up, to enable a high school kid to play university games, and sometimes down, so an older player can appear to be eligible for an underage category. For the scouts, it adds a very unwelcome cloud of uncertainty. 'If Yi Jianlian is 22 this year that's one thing, but if he's only 19 this year then he has a lot more growth potential. That would probably make him a more exciting prospect than Yao Ming,' said Arthur Volbert, a Florida-based basketball writer who has been following Chinese players for the past 20 years. Either way, Yi (pictured) is 'an exceptional player, good enough to play in the NBA right now', said Mark Fischer, a vice-president of the NBA who heads up the league's China operation. But while Chinese officials agree, they are sticking to the letter of the law so he won't be able to mix with the big boys for another three years. Volbert believes that while there are several Chinese players potentially good enough to play in the NBA who will, officially at least, hit 22 in the next few years, this year the pickings are not so rich. Like other pundits, he's tipping Tang Zhengdong as the best bet to make the grade. Tang was listed by the NBA for the draft last year but Chinese officials told him to stay right where he was. 'This year he's turning 22 and is ready to go. But we'll make sure we have full agreement from his club and the CBA before we make any move. Everything will be in order,' said his manager, Xia Song. Xia has good reason to be cautious. Xue Yuyang, another one of his players, was drafted by the Denver Nuggets three years ago but he was also told by the CBA he was too young to go. He stayed home and now at 24 he's old enough for officials to let him travel, but he hasn't appeared on the NBA wish-list since. But it was his first star who caused Xia the biggest headaches. He battled for years to bring Wang Zhizhi to the NBA, and, typically enough, had to help prove he was really two years older than officials said he was. The PLA soldier, a nimble but bulky 2.16-metre giant, was a national hero when he finally became the first Chinese player to join the NBA in 2001, but he was quickly cast as a pariah after he refused to return to China to train for the Asian Games. Instead of playing one-sided, low-profile games against weak international opposition, Wang wanted to stay in the US and build up his skills jumping with the world's best. Chinese officials went apoplectic, the star was dubbed a traitor and to all intents and purposes made to disappear - the media didn't show his games or mention his name. Submerged by Yaomania, fans stopped talking about him for the past few years, until it emerged on Friday that a rapprochement might be in the air. As stubborn as both sides may be, the Olympics are looming large and other issues suddenly seem inconsequential. Wang and the authorities are working out a way for him to return to the national squad, which could well do with the benefit of his skills and experience. Most of the Chinese national players are honing their skills in the CBA, a 12-year-old league that is becoming increasingly competitive and professional. At a typical night in the Shougang Stadium in Beijing last week, about 6,000 fans - fired on by pop tunes, chirpy cheerleaders and swaggering mascots - crammed in to watch the Peking Ducks, led by another former NBA star, Mengke Bateer, beat Dongguan New Century in a spirited battle. The two foreign imports that each team are permitted showed their class, but some local names dazzled too. More than 200 million Chinese play recreational basketball and they adore the NBA, which is aired five times a week here, but an increasing number of fans are also savouring the local flavour of the CBA. The NBA lends its expertise to help lift the playing, coaching and marketing standards of the local leagues, as does Swiss sports marketing outfit Infront, which was signed up last year in a long-term deal aimed at bolstering the league's profitability and popularity. It's a professional approach that officials say should rank the men's team in the top six and the women's in the top four by the time Beijing hosts the games. But quietly they'll admit that with the benefit of the home crowd they're expecting medals, and gold is an outside possibility. Team China's mettle will be severely tested this summer in the world championships in Japan, where they were drawn in the toughest group, up against the US, Italy, Slovenia, Puerto Rico and Senegal. But built around the talismanic Yao Ming, and with the likely return of Wang Zhizhi, the Chinese squad are showing some world-class potential. With such a large population, the national team have no shortage of big men to pick from. Scouts are often bowled over when they arrive to find battalions of seven-footers in a land not known for lanky lads. These giants are not always flukes of nature. Yao, for example, was a pedigree project bred by Mao's cadres, according to a recently published book. The 2.29-metre Houston Rockets centre was conceived by Communist party officials who pushed Shanghai's two tallest basketball players together, in the hope they would produce a giant who could bring sporting glory to the motherland, Brook Larmer, a former Newsweek journalist, wrote in his book Operation Yao Ming. Yao's parents 'were paired up at the urging of Maoist sports officials intent on creating a new generation of super-athletes ... There wasn't a national breeding programme behind this. It was being pushed by local officials in Shanghai', Larmer said, adding that this happened at a time when arranged marriages were common in China and 'work-units' had to approve marriage requests. For decades the sports system had brought together the nation's tallest people into a controlled environment, he said. 'It has fostered their intermarriage and procreation, and culled their tallest and most talented offspring to become basketball players themselves.' In addition, sports officials across the country tend to pluck the tallest 12-year-olds out of the playgrounds and put them into basketball schools, meaning the leagues have no shortage of aerial prowess. But this policy has resulted in a severe point-guard deficit, a dearth of Allen Iverson-like play-making ball carriers. Part of the problem lies in the Chinese training systems, which are slowly starting to modernise. But if Team China are to really challenge the next US Dream Team they will need to put a pile of their young players in a basketball hothouse and hope for some speedy growth, in terms of skills rather than height. The NBA is where the best should be, but others that are not ready for the top flight should consider the European and Australian options - leagues that at this stage at least still present a more competitive environment than back home. In many ways China is right to jealously guard its nascent domestic league. Building a solid league is the key element to developing the sport, and if they export all the best players it will no doubt start to crumble - but glory at the games would see basketball's popularity rocket. As the short-term priority is clearly Olympic success, the restrictions could and should be eased for a few years. Team China would benefit greatly if anyone who has the ability was allowed to dive into the deep end right now. In the meantime, perhaps CBA clubs could be allowed an extra foreign import to compensate them for the missing star and keep the standards high. In the run-up to the Olympics, Yi Jianlian and his ilk should be mixing with Kobe Bryant and LeBron James. Come 2008 he'll be up against the likes of them, and they won't care how old he is.
