On May 10th, Qingdao Manatee Football Club celebrated its 28th birthday and held a departure ceremony. With the themes of "Heritage", "Greetings" and "Dream", the celebration jointly reminisced the club's glorious journey over the past 28 years, during which the support of Qingdao Zhongneng Group was indispensable.
Since taking over Qingdao's soccer business in 2004, Zhongneng Group has invested more than 1.3 billion RMB in Qingdao's soccer, making it one of the few professional clubs in China that invests in soccer for a long period of time. The club not only plows deeply into the soccer field, but also continues to dedicate itself to the public welfare and actively contributes to the society.
In 2014, Qingdao Zhongneng FC reached a soccer cooperation agreement with Zhidan County in Shaanxi Province to help Zhidan County cultivate soccer talents and send coaches to support the development of local soccer, including school soccer, youth training camps and amateur soccer, which has been widely praised by the community.
In July of the same year, more than 10 teenage players from Zhidan County arrived in Qingdao, where they lived and ate with the Qingdao Zhongneng team and trained and competed together. Once a teenager, Bai Jinbo has grown up to be the main goalkeeper of the Manatee U21 team after his tireless efforts since coming to Qingdao in 2014.
In order to deepen the cooperation with Qingdao, Qingdao Manatee Club has provided soccer equipment and materials to Longnan and Dingxi in Gansu and Rikaze in Tibet to promote the development of local youth soccer. In the next three years, two soccer coaches will be sent to the above three places each year to provide soccer training for no less than six months, and 100 youths will be provided with the opportunity to participate in Qingdao's training camps each year, as well as bear their transportation, food and accommodation expenses, with a total assistance amounting to RMB 20 million.
In addition, Qingdao Sea Cow Football Club joined hands with Micro Dust Foundation to donate 100,000 RMB for the care of left-behind children, transferring the positive energy of soccer and contributing to the society.
