JINAN: Some Chinese sport schools are attempting to combine soccer with the traditional Chinese kungfu in Shangdong province which draws support from Chinese soccer officials.

Since last year, Shangdong sport bureau has started to launch a campaign of developing soccer in local kungfu schools.

"Students like it very much. Playing soccer is much more fun than the daily kungfu exercises," a representative from Shandong Yuncheng Songjiang kungfu school was quoted as saying by local newspaper Qilu Evening News on Sunday.

Another representative from Shangdong Laizhou kungfu school said they would have a standard soccer field built up in the coming months and "hopefully we can reap some good results in five years".

As China is striving to lift the popular sport into a new level, the measure won applause from Chinese Football Association chief Wei Di.

"It is a creative measure and needs more attention," he said while visiting Shandong during the weekend.

Shandong is the place where Water Margin or Outlaws of the Marsh, one of the four great Chinese classics, set its background in the southern Song Dynasty period. Song Jiang is the head of a group of outlaws who fought against the governments` tyranny but eventually surrendered.