On March 29, 2023, according to the website of the Hubei Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection and Supervision Committee, Yu Hongchen, the president of the Chinese Athletics Association, is suspected of serious disciplinary violations and is currently under review and investigation by the Discipline Inspection and Supervision Group of the State General Administration of Sport of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the Hubei Provincial Supervision Committee.
This landmark incident has triggered a soccer sweeping storm since last year that has involved eight key figures.
Yu Hongchen's relationship with Chinese soccer would begin in 2006, when he served as the deputy director of the Beijing Olympics Preparation Office.
In 2009, soccer set off an anti-gambling storm, the Football Association a number of leaders have been investigated. At this particular point in time, Yu Hongchen served as deputy director of the Football Management Center, bluntly stated that "the mistakes made by the industry's top leaders are heartbreaking."
At the end of 2015, the second general meeting of the 10th CFA was held, and Yu Hongchen no longer served as vice-chairman of the association, but as a full-time executive committee member.In August 2017, Yu Hongchen left the soccer field.
The timing of Yu Hongchen's departure from soccer is very coincidental as this year the FA simultaneously introduced a fantastic new strategy to ensure that young players under the age of 23 get on the pitch.
If you can't play, you can't play.
Yu Hongchen's "fame" should start from Shandong Luneng.
Let's start with an off-topic story. In the 2006 Bing Super League, Shandong Luneng rented Wang Hao for a sky-high price of $4.1 million.
After returning to Jinan, Luneng club executives repeatedly think about the lease fee, and finally decided to "write" the National Ping Yu Center, to the effect that the lease fee of Wang Hao as a permanent transfer fee, the lease into a transfer.
Cai Zhenhua, then the "head of the national football", blamed the "sky-high exit" storm on the "nonchalance" of some clubs: "Since the policy has been determined, it is impossible to change, we will not re-exit the players, will not adjust the price, and will not agree to let them move permanently. won't re-exit, won't adjust the price of players, and won't agree to let them transfer permanently."
Subsequently, Cai Zhenhua began to supervise the soccer field, and it is believed that this dispute about the Bing Super League was the starting point of the discord between Luneng and the Football Association.
In 2009, the Chinese soccer crackdown, Shandong Luneng was caught by the Football Association. The news of "buying football in the form of clubs involved in counterfeiting" spread, but in the end it did not have much impact on the club.
On the evening of April 22, 2010, Shandong Luneng hosted Liaoning Hongyun in the fifth round of the Chinese Super League. "Offside" was the most popular slogan in the province that night. This slogan was triggered by the then first assistant referee Fan Qiang.
At that time, under the special background of "black whistle" flooding, the Football Association will referee customization changed to the lottery system, a large number of business level does not meet the standard, inexperienced new referees were plucked and pushed to the first line of the Chinese Super League.
During the 90 minutes of play, Pham Cuong raised the flag for offside 12 times. Taishan were fined five times in the first half. Han Gongzheng, then executive vice president of Luneng, called the FA at half-time to complain.
The call proved to be quite timely. By the second half of the year, the unlucky side became Liaoning, which was called offside seven times.
Several Luneng executives reportedly raged outside the referee's lounge, "If you can't blow it, don't blow it, it's just amateur refereeing."
Knowing this, the four FA executives in Yongchuan, Chongqing, far away from the surface of the efforts of Yu Hongchen responsible for the technical department is still in place. He said:Â "We are aware of the situation, but everything should be done according to procedure. The principle of the FA remains the same, errors and omissions in judgment should be punished in accordance with the rules."
In the 2011 Chinese Super League (CSL), referee Ma Ning made several controversial calls in the match between Shandong Luneng and Tianjin Kangshi, showing 11 yellow cards, which ended in a draw.
This caused discontent among Shandong Luneng, who were intent on winning the title, and Han Gongzheng once again went to the FA to issue a statement.
The person in charge of picking up Luneng was Yu Hongchen. The conversation between Yu Hongchen and Han Gongzheng was very harmonious. The latter returned to Jinan confidently, and the day was August 1st. What Luneng did not expect was that they never waited for the FA.
On August 5, Yu Hongchen angrily denounced Shandong Luneng in Beijing. "Since we all chose soccer, we should respect the rules of the game in this program. If you can't afford it, you can't play."
It was also in August that year that the selection panel, headed by Hongchen, finalized Camacho as Gao Hongbo's successor in just 80 hours, canceling his scheduled trip to Brazil to interview Scolari.
Guangzhou Evergrande seven foreign aiders
The "seven foreign aiders" is a preferential policy of the CFA to take care of the Chinese Super League teams in the AFC Champions League.
After the policy was introduced, some domestic Chinese Super League clubs strongly opposed it on the grounds that it affected fairness, leading to the policy being repealed soon after. Henan Jianye became the first team to enjoy the policy in 2010.
But strangely enough, in the middle of the 2012 season, Guangzhou Evergrande's proposal to restore seven foreign aiders has been passed due to serious injuries caused by multi-line battles.
At the same time, due to the poor performance of the Chinese Super League teams other than Guangzhou Evergrande in the AFC Champions League, out earlier, only Evergrande is eligible to become the only team to enjoy the "seven foreign aid policy" that year.
The mid-season rule change and the fact that only Evergrande is playing in the AFC Champions League, no matter how you look at it, looks like a gift exclusively concocted for Guangzhou Evergrande by Yu Hongchen, who is in charge of the league.
Beijing Guoan boss said bluntly: "Now increased to seven foreign aid introduction, what is the basis, why not eight or twenty. If you run a few more times in any unit of the Football Association, you can make a proposal. If there is no procedural basis for the proposal, you can just make a suggestion, then we propose the introduction of 20 foreign aid."
In early 2013, the national soccer team played a warm-up match against Oman, where an injured national soccer team lost by a single goal, overshadowing the Asian preliminaries away to Saudi Arabia. However, the match was not a favorite.
Interestingly, a few hours after the national soccer team warm-up match, Guangzhou Evergrande and Romania's Rapid Bucharest, who are training in Spain, made their debuts in a warm-up match in which Zhang Linmiao and Rong Hao, who withdrew from the national soccer team's training due to injuries, appeared in the match.
Therefore, the behavior of the Evergrande players is defined as "fraudulent injury".
Such an event happened again in 2019. Lippi's second entry lists international players. Guangzhou Evergrande remains the international players. Xu Xin, Huang Bowen and Wei Shihao were injured and left the training squad, while Ji Zhongguo and Wang Ziming were selected as substitutes.
Just three days later, the previous due to injury to withdraw from the national training three Hengdian national football players, in the battle with Shanghai seaport of Tianwangshan all debut, and ultimately won.
Soccer Sweeps Underway
Yu Hongchen was investigated, the most striking place is also "Hubei", which is the starting point of all the storm.
Six years after leaving the company, he is still under arrest. Compared to Chen Xuyuan, who has only been in the federation for three and a half years, Hongchen will be involved in more people and events from the federation to the president of the Athletic Association, whether it is the initial management of the league or the later connection with Evergrande.
This soccer anti-corruption campaign seems to have gone beyond the FA level and is extending in a wider direction and is far from over.
Chen Yongliang was arrested some time ago and is a direct descendant of Yu Hongchen. I believe there will be an answer soon as to whether or not there is an initiator behind Hongchen and whether or not Hongchen will explain the new information.
In addition to FA executives and former coaches, a number of players have been taken away on suspicion of gambling, with "only the referee missing".
For more than a hundred days, under the magic and irony, all kinds of bad habits in Chinese soccer have been uprooted from youth soccer, professional soccer to the national team.
In a way, this explains why Chinese soccer has not taken off over the years, instead sinking in a cycle.
