City’s Chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak said that Mr Xi’s visit was “testament” to the club’s strong links with China and to its “ambitions for them to deepen and grow”.
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Later in the day, Xi addressed an opening ceremony of an annual meeting of Confucius Institutes in Britain, saying the essence of Chinese and British cultures has brought a fantastic “chemical reaction” into their own people’s way of thinking and lifestyle through people-to-people exchanges.
“Whether it is long-term projects on nuclear power in the West Country, science in Manchester, manufacturing in Scotland, we’ve got billions of pounds of Chinese investment creating thousands of jobs in Britain”, Mr Osborne told the BBC.
Xi was greeted by hundreds of enthusiastic and well-organized well-wishers in the northwest England city of Manchester.
Britain’s Prince Andrew, left, watches as Chinese President Xi Jinping, centre, views satellite coverage screens in the Network Operation Centre control room with Rupert Pearce, CEO of Inmarsat during a visit to Inmarsat in London, on the third day of his state visit to the United Kingdom, Thursday October 22, 2015. China expects to explore investment opportunities in the energy, railway and telecommunications sectors, among others, in the coming period and aims to make its relations with Great Britain a model for its engagement with the rest of Europe. He explained that the United Kingdom supports the proposed free-trade agreement between China and the EU.
In 2011, Xi outlined his three wishes for football in China – to qualify for another World Cup, to host a World Cup and to win a World Cup championship.
By attending the event, which included a student’s recitation of Xi’s poem praising a hardworking county official, the president is apparently winning more hearts and minds.
Meanwhile, with the openness of China’s capital accounts, the liberalization of interest rates and the cultivation of its bond markets, foreign investors can actively tap Chinese market in the context of the RMB’s new status, Dehn said.
Xi inducted former City player Sun Jihai into the museum’s Hall of Fame, in recognition of his role enhancing the popularity of English football in China.
It also reported that: “Cameron said Britain and China are civilised countries …”
It was a rare mention of another country’s planned vote by China, which does not like to interfere in internal affairs, and was quickly played down by a Cameron aide, who said the European Union “wasn’t a huge part of their discussion”. Xinhua is wiring a series of in-depth stories on Chinese-British relations and the visit.
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Earlier in the week, football was also on the agenda when Xi met with senior members of Britain’s royal family in London.
