With the "anti-gambling storm" sweeping through China's soccer world, many soccer players have been implicated, and individual teams have even been plunged into crisis as a result. Li Pingkang, a senior media personality, revealed that the investigation has been traced back to the tournaments from 2015 to 2018, and that a player who used to work as a goalkeeper in Shaanxi could be the target of the investigation. Li Pingkang noted that identifying the player is not difficult.
Li Pingkang further elaborated, "The investigation cases have been traced back to the 15-18 years of the tournament, and the level of investigation has even touched the China B League. Back then, numerous players frequently encountered investigations.In 2018, a goalkeeper from Shaanxi was considered to join Evergrande, but Evergrande FC canceled the transfer plan after an investigation found that the player's match performance was doubtful."
According to Li Pingkang, it was Song Zhenyu who played goalkeeper for Shaanxi in 2018, having played for the team since 2017, and was promoted with the team to the China A-League in 2019, and was also in the China B-League in 2018. During his time with Shaanxi, Song Zhenyu shined, and after the 2018 season, Guangzhou Evergrande only had one senior keeper left available in Liu Dengzheng due to a long-term injury to Zeng Cheng. Therefore, it makes sense to consider bringing in a veteran like Song Zhenyu to fill the vacancy in goal.
Song Zhenyu has played for the Chinese national soccer team many times and was the starting goalkeeper. Throughout his career, Song has caused controversy over his "style of play". For example, during his time at Changsha Jinde, he had a poor performance against Shandong Luneng, and was interviewed by the club's executives after the match, and accused of match-fixing. There were even rumors that the club had suspended him from training and playing. During his time at Chengdu Sheffield United, Song Zhenyu was suspended three times for the "scrambled egg incident", and in March 2022, Song Zhenyu officially announced his retirement.
