The Demise of Chinese Football in 2021
Football in China has always been a paradox of sorts. On the one hand, clubs have tremendous investment backing them to spend big on players and pay huge salaries, and yet on the other, the appeal of the matches and success of the teams appears to be evaporating. China’s top-down approach to most things has been the downfall of its football project in recent years, and this has been realized in the most sobering of ways in the dreadful performance of the national team in the World Cup qualifiers, crashing out barely halfway through the process.
Football in China has been in decline for several years, and the combination of Chinese Football Association mismanagement with its top-down approach, and the pandemic, is causing an erosion in the fan-base and financial stability of the domestic league. ©Jannes Glas/Unsplash
China’s qualification at the 2002 World Cup looks more and more like a massive anomaly with each passing year. The team has tried to muster up talent, and the Chinese Football Association has taken a heavy-handed approach when it comes to controlling the development of its squads. They’ve effectively turned one of the nation’s most successful clubs Guangzhou FC into a training squad for the best Chinese players. This has been achieved mostly through illegal player transfers and a shady-opaque financial strategy that the federation appears happy to let slide.
The calamity of Chinese football doesn’t stop there. Most of the problems embattling the sport can be categorized into two areas the endogenous and exogenous. Endogenously, that is the internal mismanagement by the Chinese Football Association, there has been a calamity of errors and a fundamental misdirection in China’s football approach. Scheduling matches at random hours of the day, forcing players on the cusp of the national squad to do military conscription training, and halting the league anytime the national team have a match. All of these factors have been designed by the CFA with the intent to prioritize the national team, but the consequence has been a stifling of organic growth and the emergence of talent from other areas.
External factors have been a massive detriment on the Chinese football league too. COVID has wreaked havoc across global sport, but the way in which Chinese officials have crippled CSL by not allowing any supporters back into the stadium has been a major disappointment for clubs. Even whilst millions of people are crammed into transport trains around the cities across China, not a single supporter has been allowed back into football stadiums since the start of the pandemic.
Clubs in China Stifled by CFA Mismanagement and Financial Issues
The lack of supporters in stadiums has been a catastrophe for many clubs’ financial positions. All told, over the past three seasons at least 15 clubs across China’s domestic divisions have ceased operations. Without the revenue generated by supporters, it is practically impossible for many of these clubs to stay afloat. Even the country’s most successful club Guangzhou FC is on the brink, with its biggest shareholder the debt-ridden construction company Evergrande, Guangzhou FC players haven’t been paid in several months, and they have a half-finished stadium sitting empty on the outskirts of the city.
These factors have been made immeasurably worse by China’s reluctance to prioritize domestic leagues in the country. The national team is always given priority, and this is ultimately damaging the integrity of the league and its ability to grow a sustainable commercial model. Football at its core should be an easy-to-access and be a sport that everyone can enjoy. The power of football is allowing clubs to dictate the course of how their season will pan out, but as is always the case in China the top-down approach is damaging the integrity of the game.
If China doesn’t allow stadiums to open again in 2022 it may run the risk of alienating the last football fans that remain in the country. But whether the CFA will care or not remains to be seen. In any case, the Chinese Super League reputation is heavily tarnished at this point, the artificial novelty appeal quickly wore off amongst European fans and Chinese supporters are dwindling month-by-month.
