With the much-anticipated 2023 season about to blossom, after three years of silence, the Chinese soccer world ushered in a grand Golden Ball Gala to bring the 2022 Chinese soccer year to a successful conclusion.
In the late afternoon of April 14, the China Football Youth Training Development Summit Forum and the 2022 Golden Ball Award Ceremony kicked off. While unveiling a number of award winners, including the Chinese Golden Ball Award, Women's Golden Ball Award, Best Coach Award and Best Junior Award, the ceremony also featured in-depth discussions on topics such as youth soccer training, coach training, women's soccer development and sports education integration, building a bridge of communication for many domestic youth soccer training organizations and practitioners.
At the awards ceremony, Beijing Guoan striker-killer Zhang Yuning, with the glory of being the local Chinese Super League (CSL) top scorer for the 2022 season, was honored with the China Golden Ball Award for the first time, squeezing former Golden Ball winner Wu Lei as well as CSL title winner Xie Pengfei out of the Golden Ball lineup. Wang Shanshan, who has just returned from Europe to take part in training, and Shui Qingxia, head coach of the Chinese women's soccer team, who made a splash at the Asian Cup in early 2022, won the Women's Golden Ball and Best Coach awards respectively.
Between Zhang Yuning, Wu Lei and Xie Pengfei, three of the Chinese Super League's top scorers, the race for the 2022 Ballon d'Or was incredibly tight. After voting by 120 senior media members, Zhang Yuning, who played steadily, won the judges' favor with a superb score of 476 points, narrowly beating Xie Pengfei, who scored 275 points, and Wu Lei, who scored 241 points. Zhang Yuning won the Golden Ball Award for the first time, becoming the fourth winner after Feng Xiaoting, Wu Xi and Wu Lei.
2022 Ballon d'Or winner Zhang Yuning
Under the careful arrangement of Sports Media, the organizer of the Golden Ball Award, Zhang Yuning's father, Zhang Quancheng, was present to present the trophy to his son, who is about to embark on a new journey in the Chinese Super League.
The 2022 Golden Marshal Award represents the honor of the best Chinese soccer coach of the year and is contested by women's football coach Shui Qingxia, Dalian coach Xie Hui and Shanghai Shenhua coach Wu Jingui. Although a year has passed since the Women's Asian Cup, the outstanding performance of the Chinese women's soccer team in India is still fresh in our minds. With 616 votes, Shui Qingxia topped the list, beating out Xie Hui's 329 points and Wu Jingui's 199 points. Shui Qingxia returned to China to receive her award at the ceremony, which was presented by former Chinese women's soccer coach Shang Ruihua.
Wang Shanshan, who returned home along with Shui Qingxia, is slightly behind in the race for the Women's Golden Ball award. Her stellar performance in the Indian women's soccer team's Asia Cup, especially her ups and downs in the semifinals and finals, epitomized China's women's soccer team's first loss and then victory. Wang Shanshan won the Women's Golden Ball with 472 votes topping Zhang Linyan's 323 and Tang Jiali's 278. Ma Xiaoxu, the current coach of the Chinese women's soccer team, attended the ceremony to present the award to Wang Shanshan.
Due to some objective reasons, China U21 Golden Boy Award winner Efirdin Eskal and U17 Golden Boy Award winner Liu Chen were unable to attend the ceremony. After coordination, the organizers of China Golden Ball Award delivered the trophies to them, and the two young players expressed their gratitude to the fans and media through VCR.
The China Futsal Golden Ball Award, presented by a special panel of judges from the China Golden Ball Award Organizing Committee, was won by Chen Zhiheng of Shenzhen Nanling Iron Wolves. He beat Ji Sheng Enamel's 39 points and Zhang Bin's 33 points with 57 votes. The award was presented to Chen Zhiheng by Jing Zhihui, Vice President of the Sichuan University Sports Association, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to university futsal.
It is worth mentioning that this Golden Ball Award ceremony not only presented the regular awards, but also added a youth training sharing and thematic discussion sessions: Zhejiang Professional Football Club Youth Training Director Ikegaya Youliang shared his team's philosophy of cultivating self-reliant players instead of tactical players, hoping to contribute to the youth training of Chinese soccer; Wang Jianjun, Director of the Women's Youth Training Center of the CFA (Suzhou), Lv Jun, Director of the Men's Youth Training Department of CFA Wang Jianjun, Director of Women's Football Youth Training Center of CFA (Suzhou), Lv Jun, Youth Training Director of Men's Football Department of CFA, Wang Anzhi, former Head Coach of China U-17 National Women's Football Team, Deng Navy, General Manager of Youth Training of Shenzhen Nanling Ironwolf Soccer Club, and other experts in the industry participated in the discussion.
As in previous years, the organizing committee of the China Golden Ball Awards presented a special award to the organizing committee at the ceremony. This honor was awarded to Xu Kiren, Director of the Sports Department of Xinhua News Agency, Executive Committee Member of the CFA and Director of the Press Committee, and Feng Jianming, former Director of the Press Office and Director of the Youth Department of the CFA. As a representative of China's sports media people, Xu Kiren has been following the development of Chinese soccer in all fields. He attends the Golden Ball Awards ceremony every year to speak out for Chinese soccer. At the award ceremony, Xu Kiren also delivered a speech on solving the problem of integrating sports and education, analyzing in depth the difficulties of integrating sports and education in Chinese soccer.
In addition to the traditional soccer awards, the organizing committee of the 2022 China Golden Ball Awards continued to work with Tencent Hootsuite to present the Football eSports Award for the sixth consecutive year. Manchester City eSports Club won the Best Football eSports Club Award, Li Sijun of Manchester City eSports and Dong Wenbin of Yantai WT tied for the Mr. Football eSports of the Year trophy for FIFAOnline4, and Jin Shihao was elected Mr. Football eSports of the Year for FIFA Soccer World. wang Risong, Publisher of FIFA category games, head of FIFAOnline4 Wang Tao and FIFA Soccer World leaders attended the award ceremony.
At the end of the award ceremony, the organizing committee of China Golden Ball Awards and many judges launched eight jury initiatives, aiming to set an example for Chinese soccer and spread positive energy. In the face of the serious crisis in the external image and public opinion environment of Chinese soccer, the organizing committee called on the whole industry to unite and help Chinese soccer get back on the right track.
The China Ballon d'Or Award is a competition for Chinese footballers that takes into account the performance of the candidates throughout the year in a full series of matches, initiated and organized by the sports media.The 2022 China Ballon d'Or Award jury consists of 120 representatives of authoritative domestic sports media, international media journalists and invited media personalities, and details of the ballots will be announced in the sports media magazine Soccerweekly.
Attachment: List of 2022 Chinese Golden Ball winners
Zhang Yuning, China Golden Ball Award
China Golden Marshal Award: Shui Qingxia
China U21 Golden Boy Award: Efirdin Eskal
China U17 Golden Boy Award: Liu Chen
China Women's Golden Ball Award: Wang Shanshan
China Futsal Golden Ball Award: Chen Zhiheng
Soccer Gaming Club of the Year: Manchester City Gaming Club
Mr. Football Gaming of the Year (FIFAOnline4): Li Sijun, Dong Wenbin
Mr. Football Gaming of the Year (FIFA Soccer World): Kim Shiho
