Since the 2011 season, the Chinese Super League has won five titles: Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Port, Jiangsu Suning, Shandong Taishan and Wuhan. In addition to the disbanded Jiangsu Suning, we will find one more problem: Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Port and Wuhan, three teams that won the title in the same way, only Shandong Taishan.
What's the difference?
Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Port, Wuhan Three Town, these three teams basically rely on the music department crazy "buy, buy, buy", in a short period of time to create a super luxury lineup, soaring results, and ultimately achieve the purpose of winning the championship.
Shandong Taishan is not, there are not too many big foreign aid, there is no crazy "buy, buy, buy", adhere to their own strengthen the idea, win the championship. Not only the 2021 season of the Double Crown, but also the 2006-2010 season of the "Luneng Dynasty", seems to be this characteristic.
In a short period of time, the strength of the team can grow rapidly. This method has given Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Port and Wuhan a taste of sweetness and proved that this method is indeed feasible. Why is Shandong Taishan not willing to follow suit? Is it lack of money or other difficulties?
First, large capital investments require complex approval processes
As we all know, Shandong Taishan team is backed by a state-owned enterprise, which is completely different from the other three teams (although Shanghai Port is also a state-owned enterprise, but thanks to Chen Xuyuan, we all know that in our hearts). It is for this reason that every expenditure of the team requires strict scrutiny and instructions.
How much is needed and the purpose is clear. Depending on the year of the Super League, the music department will have a detailed plan awaiting approval from the higher ups. If you want to survive millions for the music department you may just need the traditional program, but once it comes to large expenditures such as bringing in big foreigners, many international players, often beyond the budget, these need to be decided and discussed in more detail.
As a result, Taishan seems to be rich, but the fact is that the flexibility behind the capital is far less flexible than the other three teams. You can compare Xu Jiayin's attitude towards Evergrande's signings. You can also see clues in the fact that Shanghai has the courage to keep bringing in big foreigners like Hulk, Oscar and Arnautovic.
Shandong Taishan is very envious of these.
II. Face-saving (youth training first)
As we all know, Shandong Taishan team has the best youth training talent cultivation base in Chinese soccer behind it. Nowadays, the players of Luneng Soccer School are basically all over most of the teams, no matter they are in the Chinese Super League, the Chinese First League or the Chinese Second League. With the mature training system and down-to-earth training path, the soccer school enjoys a great reputation at home and abroad.
Luneng Soccer School is the reserve talent base of Shandong Taishan team. The team does not need to buy people everywhere like other teams. Whenever the Taishan team lacks talents, they can go to Luneng Soccer School for selection, and the young players of Luneng Soccer School also aim to enter the first team of Taishan.
Against this background, Shandong Taishan has been reluctant to spend a lot of money on players. If you spend a lot of money on other players every year, it will undoubtedly make the media criticize and further question the false name of Luneng youth training, which their team does not like.
Although the club has never acknowledged the problem, fans and media understand that this issue cannot be discussed on the table. We can take a very realistic example: we all know that in the past two years, the Taishan team has not been strong in terms of young players, that is to say, there have not been too many exciting young players, but the first team does have a lot of young players. What does this mean? It shows that we would rather enrich the first team with a lot of young players and give them more time to train than risk being criticized by the media by bringing in other good young players.
It comes down to saving face.
3. The domestic players are not bad
That's the main reason the club doesn't want to follow the lead of the other three teams.
We temporarily in addition to the foreign aid factor, Guangzhou Evergrande can dominate the league for many years, crazy digging the core players of the main players, almost the whole national team is their own, who do not envy such a level? Wuhan three town into the Chinese super league, also introduced some national soccer resume players, directly change the original lineup, coupled with China's soccer environment downturn, Wuhan three town use this opportunity to become famous in one fell swoop.
In fact, Shandong Taishan could do this, after all, most teams are on the brink of survival right now, and while they don't want to sell their core players, there's no way to continue living. At this point, buying good players won't cost much.
But the Taishan team didn't do that because the current domestic players are basically international players. That means that even if you buy a good player, there's basically not much difference between their power and their own players, so naturally there's no point in wasting too much money here.
For example, Wu Xinghan, Liu Binbin, Jin Jingdao, Zheng Zheng, Wang Dalei, Liu Yang, and Ji Xiang, all of these players have international backgrounds, and many are current internationals. Also, Guo Tianyu and Duan Liuyu are worthy young offspring, so there's really no need to buy any more players.
Of course, the team also has weaknesses, such as the midfield position. Ever since Ai Junmin left, Shandong Taishan have been having headaches with this position. Xu Xin has been here before, but unfortunately he only stayed for one season before being poached by Shanghai Port. Without a team and unable to find one in the transfer market, Taishan usually give this position to foreigners, such as Sun Junho, with Fellaini being the leader in the midfield position. Guo Tianyu is not in very good form and there are not many good domestic strikers, so Taishan will target foreigners as well.
IV. Writing at the end
Every team has its own philosophy of survival, there is no right or wrong, only achievements. Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Port and Wuhan are simple and rough, but they did achieve results recognized by fans. Shandong Taishan has a good resource advantage, but has not achieved good results for many years, which worries everyone. Fortunately, in the past two years, it seized the opportunity to win a few titles and further stabilized the concept of team building.
From the club's perspective, there is no problem with either building a team with money or enriching the first team with youth training. But from the perspective of the future of Chinese soccer, Shandong Taishan's thinking is undoubtedly more sought after. After all, without the foundation of youth training, surviving on buyers will only make Chinese soccer less and less talented.
