CHINESE SUPER LEAGUE

The 'Chinese Football Association Super League' (Simplified Chinese: 中国足球协会超级联赛), commonly known as 'Chinese Super League' (中超联赛) or 'CSL', is the highest tier of professional football in the People's Republic of China, operating under the auspices of the Chinese Football Association.
The Super League was created by the rebranding of the former top division ''Chinese Football Association Jia A League'' (Not to be confused with Chinese Football Association Jia League, which is the current second tier league.) in 2004.
Originally contested by 12 teams in the inaugural year, the league has been expanding. There are 15 teams in the current season. The title has been won by three teams: Shenzhen Jianlibao, Dalian Shide and Shandong Luneng. The current Super League champions are Shandong Luneng.
Promotion and relegation take place between the Super League and the second tier Chinese Football Association Jia League (Jia means first or 'A' in Chinese). There were no relegation in the first 2 seasons of the league in a bid to expand the league. Chongqing Lifan became the first team to be relegated in 2006 after finishing bottom of the table for 3 consecutive seasons.

Contents

Overview

Competition format

Sponsorship

Foreign Players

History

Super League Clubs 2007

Former Super League Clubs

Super League champions

Top scorers

See also

Reference

External links

Overview

Competition format

In each season, each club plays each of the other clubs twice, once at home and another away. In 2004, there were 12 clubs in the Super League, so the teams played 22 games each for a total of 132 games in the season. In 2005, there were 14 clubs in the league, so the teams played 26 games each for a total of 182 games in the season. With 15 teams in the league in 2006 and, each team had to play 28 games in the season for 210 games in total. ^[1]
From 2008 onwards, at the end of each season the two lowest placed teams are relegated into the Chinese Football Association Jia League and the top two teams from the Jia League are promoted in their place.
The champions of the League, as well as the winner of the Chinese FA Cup, qualify for the AFC Champions League of the next year. If a team won the league and cup double, the runner-up of the league will take the Champions League spot.

Sponsorship

The first title sponsor of the league was Siemens. Following a controversial first season, Siemens did not renew its multi-million dollars sponsorship of the league. The start of the second season in 2005 had to be delayed a month in order to find new sponsors. When no title sponsor was found the League was simply called Chinese Football Association Super League.

★ 2004 Season: Siemens (Siemens Chinese Super League)

★ 2005 Season: No sponsor (Chinese Football Association Super League)

★ 2006 Season: iPhox (iPhox Chinese Super League)

★ 2007 Season: Kingway (Kingway Chinese Super League)

Foreign Players

Professional footballers in China receive relatively high salaries both when compared to other Chinese sports leagues and football leagues in other countries. As a result, numerous players from Serbia, Brazil and other Latin American regions make up the foreign players in the Chinese league. The league has rules, however, restricting the number of foreign players strictly to three per team.

History

The CSL was founded in 2004 as a replacement for the previous Division I (Jia A, or 甲A) league, with 12 teams in the league. The inaugural season was plagued with grave controversy.
The original plan was to have one relegation and two promotions for the 2004 season and 2005 season, thus increasing the number of teams in 2006 to 14. But the FA's decisions caused the relegations to be cancelled for these 2 years.
For the 2005 season, the league expanded to 14 teams after Wuhan Huanghelou and Zhuhai Zhongbang won promotion from the Jia League. The Zhuhai team, formerly ''Zhuhai Anping'', had been bought by the Shanghai Zhongbang real estate company and relocated to Shanghai for the 2005 season, and subsequently renamed to Shanghai Zobon.
In 2006, the league was planned to expand to 16 teams with the newly promoted Xiamen Lanshi and Changchun Yatai, however, Sichuan Guancheng withdrew before the start of the season, leaving only 15 teams when the season started on March 11th. Shanghai Liancheng Zobon after another change of ownership was renamed Shanghai United F.C.
In 2007, the league was planned to be expanded to 16 teams as well but once again, it found itself 1 team short. Shanghai United F.C.'s owner, Zhu Jun bought a major share from local rival Shanghai Shenhua and merged the 2 teams. As a result, Shanghai Shenhua retained its name as it already had a strong fanbase in the city, while Shanghai United F.C. was pulled out from the league.

Super League Clubs 2007

Club	Chinese name	Seasons in CSL	Best finish, Season	Worst finish, Season
Beijing Guo'an	北京国安	2004 to 2007	3rd, 2006	7th, 2004
Changchun Yatai	长春亚泰	2006 & 2007	4th, 2006	4th, 2006
Dalian Shide	大连实德	2004 to 2007	1st, 2005	5th, 2004 & 2006
Liaoning F.C.	辽宁足球俱乐部	2004 to 2007	4th, 2004	12th, 2006
Qingdao Zhongneng	青岛中能	2004 to 2007	7th, 2005	14th, 2006
Shandong Luneng	山东鲁能	2004 to 2007	1st, 2006	3rd, 2005
Shanghai Shenhua	上海申花	2004 to 2007	2nd, 2005 & 2006	10th, 2004
Changsha Ginde	长沙金德	2004 to 2007	8th, 2004	13th, 2005 & 2006
Shenzhen Shangqingyin	深圳上清饮	2004 to 2007	1st, 2004	12th, 2005
Tianjin Teda	天津泰达	2004 to 2007	4th, 2005	6th, 2004 & 2006
Wuhan Guanggu	武汉光谷	2005 to 2007	5th, 2005	10th, 2006
Xiamen Lanshi	厦门蓝狮	2006 & 2007	8th, 2006	8th, 2006
Shaanxi Baorong	陕西宝荣	2004 to 2007	3rd, 2004	8th, 2005
Zhejiang Lücheng	浙江绿城	2007
Henan Jianye	河南建业	2007

Former Super League Clubs

Club	Chinese name	Seasons in CSL	Best finish, Season	Worst finish, Season
Sichuan Guancheng	四川冠城	2004 to 2005	9th, 2004 & 2005	9th, 2004 & 2005
Chongqing Lifan	重庆力帆	2004 to 2006	12th, 2004	15th, 2006
Shanghai United F.C.	上海联城	2005 to 2007	7th, 2006	11th, 2005

For a list of all clubs past and present see List of Chinese Super League clubs.

Super League champions

Season	Winner	Total wins	Runner-up	Third
2004	Shenzhen Jianlibao	1	Shandong Luneng	Inter Shanghai
2005	Dalian Shide	1	Shanghai Shenhua	Shandong Luneng
2006	Shandong Luneng	1	Shanghai Shenhua	Beijing Guoan

For a list of Champions in Chinese Professional Football see Chinese football champions

Top scorers

Season	Top scorer	Club	Goals
2004	Kwame Ayew	Inter Shanghai	17
2005	Branko Jelic	Beijing Hyundai	21
2006	Li Jinyu	Shandong Luneng	26

See also

★ Football in China

★ Chinese Football Association

★ Chinese Football Association Jia League

★ Chinese Football Association Yi League

★ Chinese FA Cup

Reference

1. http://sports.sohu.com/20070326/n248985208.shtml

External links

★ Official site of the Chinese Super League (In Chinese)

★ Official site of the Chinese Football Association (In Chinese)

★ Sinosoc (In English)

★ Football Asia

★ AFC Asian Football Confederation

★ AFC Champions League