EDMONTON, Alberta — China hosted the inaugural Women’s World Cup in 1991 and put on the Cup again in 2007. It finished second to the United States at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and in the 1999 World Cup. And its star forward at the time, Sun Wen, joined with the American Michelle Akers in being named the greatest female soccer players of the 20th century.

But that golden era of women’s soccer in the world’s most populous nation has faded. China did not even qualify for the 2011 Women’s World Cup or the 2012 London Olympics. And as it opens the 2015 World Cup on Saturday against host Canada here, China no longer has the best women’s team in Asia, much less the world.

The reasons officials and coaches cite for the decline are varied. For starters, other Asian countries have caught up in terms of resources put into women’s soccer. Japan is the reigning World Cup champion. Australia, which plays in the Asian region, is ranked ahead of China, and so is North Korea, though it was barred from this year’s Cup because of a doping scandal.

China has startlingly few female soccer players, given its population of 1.4 billion, which in part reflects a historic emphasis on elite sports for medals instead of grass-roots sports for everyone.