"PEOPLE think an oval ball means American football," Zhong Min said, reflectively. So before the China Rugby Football Association (CRFA), the ten-year-old fledgeling of which Zhong is deputy secretary-general, can develop rugby they must first educate more of the country’s vast population about the sport.

This is not an easy task at a time when every effort in the country is bent towards the Olympic Games to be staged here in 2008. The International Rugby Board’s hopes of including sevens in the Olympics came to nothing last year, a blow to China, among many others, because the abbreviated game offers the best opportunity of success, as well as the access to increased funding that Olympic participation brings.

Sevens takes priority here because it offers hopes of medals and, thereby, recognition by the sports ministry, the media and business.

China are ranked third in Asia, behind Japan and South Korea, while, two years ago, the inaugural world university sevens tournament was hosted by Beijing, at the China Agricultural University (CAU), which has embraced rugby and where the visiting Leicester delegation yesterday spent a humid afternoon coaching China’s national squads, male and female.

"Technically they are very proficient," Martin Johnson, the former England captain, said. Johnson and Rory Underwood, England’s record tryscorer, have attracted considerable media attention over the past three days, precisely what the CRFA requires, but they also need help to improve their officials. They hope that Leicester will use their influence to send an English coach and referee to their national championships in September, before the meat of the strategic partnership signed this week between the club and China takes effect.

It is continuity that China requires. They welcomed the decision of the IRB to stage a leg of the sevens grand prix in Beijing in 2001 and Shanghai a year later, but although a further tournament was scheduled for Beijing in 2003 it was cancelled after the outbreak of Sars and has not returned.

But the CRFA must also reach out to families required to comply with the one-child policy introduced to put a brake on the population increase.

Parents need to be assured that their child will not be involved in a dangerous sport. Here again, media exposure can help and it was suggested by Professor Chen Zhangliang, the CAU president, that the presence of an international team for a one-off match in Beijing would be beneficial.

Zhong sees a potential chain for the growth of junior rugby in direct links between primary schools, high schools and universities, but his immediate problem is what comes next. Once university students graduate, their first requirement is a job and many do not continue playing sport, or where rugby is concerned, do not have the opportunity to do so because there are so few senior clubs, nor has the People’s Liberation Army been able to sustain its interest in rugby.

"If we are to establish more clubs, we need sponsorship," Zhong said and there are enough overseas companies keen to become involved in the Chinese economy who have a knowledge of rugby in the West. "We think that, for every child who plays the game, there may be ten adults behind him and that’s what we are aiming for. If we are among the medals in the Asian Games [in Doha in December], we can ask the Government to pay more attention to us."

China will take part in the second world university sevens tournament to be held in Rome between August 4-6, when, for the first time, a Great Britain squad will participate. John Houston, the Scotland sevens payer and a student at Heriot-Watt University, will captain the Britain squad, which includes four players from Hartpury College in Gloucestershire.