The new president of the Football Association, Song Kai, launched his first league notice at the start of his new job, requiring professional teams at all levels in China to submit relevant access documents by December 5th. This has brought forward the access drama that was staged in the spring of previous years.
Currently, China's soccer league is gradually shifting from the era of golden dollar soccer, which is supported by real estate enterprises, to a new era of public welfare soccer, which is led by urban investment companies. Cangzhou Lions, as a representative of the transition between the old and new eras, are now at the forefront of the access competition. However, having completed share reform, they have been exposed to the problem of long-term unpaid wages.
Exaggerated accounts of how long the Cangzhou Lions have been in arrears have been as long as five years, with widespread reports of three years. A review of past reports shows that the team has been linked to rumors of back pay almost every year. During this year's spring access tournament, it was revealed that the team was at least 13 months in arrears and that six players had refused to sign paycheck acknowledgment forms, despite which the FFA cleared them for access.
Although the Chinese Football Association (CFA) has a lot of problems at home, it is somewhat helpless in front of FIFA. In June of this year, FIFA penalized the Cangzhou Lions with a "ban on registering new players" for "failing to implement an arbitration award". This penalty seems to indicate that the Cangzhou Lions did not escape the supervision of FIFA, but in the transnational disputes, the team may be involved in the problem of unpaid wages of foreign aid, and the Chinese Super League has always been the tradition of unpaid foreign aid.
So how did the FA pass the Cangzhou Lions in the case of six players clearly not signed? Behind this, we have to mention a "magic operation" of the FA: whether the players need to go through the arbitration of the FA, the arbitration case will be categorized as a "dispute". Therefore, players who have not signed a contract are regarded as "disputes" rather than "salary arrears", which will not affect the club's access audit. Furthermore, some players have received the results of the FA's arbitration on unpaid wages the day after the transfer window closed, which, although it does not affect the club's entry, prevents the player from joining a new team immediately after the confirmation of unpaid wages, and leaves them at home for six months awaiting the opening of the summer window.
However, not all teams in the Chinese Football Association can pass the access. The Cangzhou Lions got in because they have completed a shareholding reform. As we all know, Chen Xuyuan, the former chairman of the CFA, advocates "public welfare soccer", believing that the era of golden dollar soccer is over and the survival of the soccer sector in the future should be shared by enterprises with a sense of social responsibility, which not only reduces the pressure of funding from individual enterprises, but also promotes the development of the soccer cause.
While companies with social responsibility are naturally represented by state-owned enterprises, the reality of the Chinese Super League clubs is that they are city investment companies across the country. The Cangzhou Lions, formerly known as Shijiazhuang Yongchang, relocated to Cangzhou precisely because of the capital injection from Cangzhou Construction Investment. Currently, Cangzhou CIC and Yongchang Real Estate each hold a 50% stake in the club, with Yongchang Real Estate continuing to be responsible for the club's day-to-day operations.
The era of gold-dollar soccer dominated by real estate companies had a fatal flaw in that the fate of clubs depended entirely on how well the real estate companies were run. In contrast, public interest soccer dominated by city investment companies is more stable, but it also suffers from one fatal flaw - leadership turnover. Previously, Shaanxi Chang'an Athletic went into decline due to this flaw, and Cangzhou Lions are now facing the same problem.
The Canyon Lions seem to combine the fatal flaws of two eras, and it's only a matter of God's will whether this team survives.
According to Soccer Daily, four teams in the Chinese Super League are still facing difficulties in survival, and two other teams with relegation status are also in serious crisis. Despite the early start of the race for admission, many exciting stories are sure to emerge, so stay tuned.
