Long before the English Football association established the first universally accepted rules at the Freemasons’ Tavern, London, in 1863, the Chinese – “a great bunch of lads” played cuju.
Cuju, an ancient competitive ball kicking game first practiced as a Chinese military activity in 300 BC, was hugely popular in Chinese society right up until the ‘Ming dynasty’ (1368-1644). The Ming Dynasty, no doubt governed by direct ancestors of our own Luke Ming Flanagan, brought an affiliation of corruption and brothels to the game. The tarnished reputation of cuju led to the game being outlawed, and in the present day extinct.
In recent times when we hear Chinese sport, we think of frantic table tennis players in the Olympics – crouching tiger hidden paddle -, but since 2012 the Chinese Super League has been slowly gathering momentum with high profile figures such as Nicolas Anelka, Didier Drogba and World Cup winning manager Luiz Felipe Scolari being attracted by the astronomical wages on offer.
The 2017 Chinese Super League season begins in March after what has been a staggering active transfer window featuring plenty of obnoxious contract deals bringing the league into disrepute. From the outside looking in, it appears Chinese billionaires are playing fantasy football, but could the Chinese become the next footballing super power?
The top two highest earning footballers in the world now play in China for Shanghai based clubs, Carlos Tevez (Argentina) and Oscar (Brazil) boasting salaries of £615,000 and £400,000 per week respectively. Despite the trend of ridiculously overpriced wages, the Chinese Super League have reduced its foreign player quota to help curb spending and add incentive for Chinese home grown players. The number of foreign players allowed to appear at any given time for each club has been reduced from four to three. Maybe we should start taking Chinese football seriously!
With a population of almost 1.4 Billion people, there is bound to be a few Lionel Messi’s in the mix, right? President Xi Junping has built 20,000 football schools in a bid to reform Chinese grassroots football. By the sheer volume of talented Chinese players these schools will produce, China is likely to make serious waves at national and club level in years to come. The total amount spent by Super League clubs on oversees players in 2016 was $451.3 million which appears to only be the tip of the ice berg. As the overall standard of the league improves there will likely be a snowball effect with better players making the lucrative move to the East Asian league.
There may also be good news for the European leagues who will benefit from new Chinese TV revenue deals which are set to be introduced as soon as next season. Surprisingly the Bundesliga is currently the most popular European soccer league in China followed by the Premier League. Unfortunately, it seems money will continue to dictate the puppet show that is football, but here’s to hoping the sports golden years are still yet to come.
Familiar Players and Managers involved in the 2017 Chinese Super League:
| Player/Manager | Previous Clubs |
| Stephane Mbia | Marseille, QPR, Sevilla |
| Christian Bassong | Newcastle, Spurs, Norwich |
| Gervinho | Arsenal, Roma |
| Obafemi Martins | Inter Milan, Newcastle, Wolfsburg |
| John Obi Mikel | Chelsea |
| Papiss Cisse | Newcastle |
| Axel Witsel | Benfica, Zenit St. Petersburg |
| Nikola Jelavic | Everton, Hull, West Ham |
| Graziano Pelle | Southampton |
| Ricardo Carvalho | Real Madrid, Chelsea, Monaco |
| Burak Yilmaz | Galatasaray |
| Ezequiel Lavezzi | Napoli, PSG |
| Carlos Tevez | West Ham, Man Utd, Man City, Juventus |
| Alex Teixeira | Shaktar Donetsk |
| Hulk | Porto, Zenit St. Petersburg |
| Oscar | Chelsea |
| Ramires | Chelsea |
| Alexandro Pato | AC Milan |
| Jackson Martinez | Porto, Athletico Madrid |
| Luiz Felipe Scolari | Chelsea |
| Fabio Cannavaro | Real Madrid |
| Andre Villa Boas | Porto, Chelsea, Spurs |
| Manuel Pellegrini | Man City, Real Madrid |
| Felix Magath | Bayern Munich, Schalke, Fulham |
| Gus Poyet | Brighton, Sunderland |
By Ciarán Cunningham, – 01/03/2017