Ron Atkinson admits the tour has got better with age. 'Three weeks going on 10 years,' was how he described it at the time, managing players who were often bored, far from home and longing for the familiar jaunt to Majorca.
From the moment they returned, however, stories were polished and West Bromwich Albion basked in history as the first football club to travel inside China as it emerged from relative isolation following the death of Mao Tse-tung.
Four decades and one massive industrial revolution later and the world's most populous nation is an economic powerhouse with its own Super League paying some of the biggest salaries in world sport.