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Chinese football caught foul
If you do not read the sport pages in China, you would not know that the "October Revolution" took place in the nation's football business.
On October 2, Beijing Guo'an, one of the 12 teams in the nation's top-flight Chinese Super League, refused to play on as a protest over a refereeing decision. And then after eventually being fined 300,000 yuan (US$36,275), the club threatened to withdraw from the league altogether. Several other clubs also started making noises and backed the walk-off of the club, which has always been considered the least rebellious of all. Later in the same month, Xu Ming, president of Dalian Shide Football Club, issued a series of statements, including an open letter to the China Football Association (CFA), that aimed to "launch a revolution" in Chinese football. There was also a flurry of meetings and announcements in an attempt to relinquish the overbearing grip of the CFA. On October 26, the CFA's Executive Vice-president, Yan Shiduo, who was squarely in Xu's sights, was quoted by local Chinese media as replying: "This is an outrageous challenge to the CFA's authority. The CFA will always control Chinese football." And despite the build-up and expectation, the crisis ended with a whimper rather than a bang. Then more recently, on November 17, the national team lost its final chance to sneak into the 2006 World Cup finals - despite demolishing Hong Kong 7-0. It came in the wake of the nation's dismal 2002 World Cup final campaign where the side failed to score a goal. Yan and Xu are symbols in a conflict that has been plaguing Chinese football for a long time. Whereas Yan epitomizes power and authority, Xu personifies money and capital. In 1999, Xu, who made his "first pot of gold" from exporting shrimp, paid 102 million yuan (US$12 million) and bought Shide from Wanda, a local football club, after first paying 60 million yuan (US$7.3 million) for the naming rights. By that time, Chinese football was several years into a reform push to remove teams from government bodies and turn them into businesses. Sport, like performing arts, had always been under the auspices of government funding and management. The first spark of free-market reform flared up in 1984 when Guangzhou Baiyun Pharmaceutical Co shelled out 160,000 yuan (US$19,000) to attach its name to the municipal football team. Ten years later, Apollo, another Guangzhou-based enterprise, bought the team's controlling stake from the local government football association for 2 million yuan (US$240,000). However, the honeymoon period of professional football did not last long. After hundreds of millions of yuan in investment, which pushed up players' salaries, the dream of high returns never really eventuated. "In the seven years when Dalian was operational under the Wanda name, we put in 200 million yuan (US$24 million) to construct facilities and hire players," said Wang Jianlin, then club's owner. Huge price According to Sanlian Life Weekly, an average team needs an injection of 40 million yuan (US$4.8 million) per year just to stay afloat. It is no secret that several clubs have deferred payments to their players. Shenzhen Jianlibao, this season's Super League champion, is 60 million yuan (US$7.25 million) in the red, which includes unpaid salaries to star players. When Jianlibao bought the team two years ago for 50 million (US$6.04 million), some deemed it a bargain. But after a 200 million yuan (US$24 million) investment, Jianlibao, a sports drinker bottler, is having a hard time off-loading the team. "They don't want anything for the side, except for the new owner to pay off its 60-million-yuan (US$7.3 million) debt," clarifies Xie Yi, one of the country's leading football analysts. Xie, until recently editor-in-chief of Football, which is one of the most influential newspapers in the field, says as local clubs are not able to sell television rights to the games. They are losing up to 50 per cent of the revenue that an equivalent club in the West would be entitled to. In China, the CFA keeps the broadcast fees and the clubs have to make do with tickets sales, naming rights and merchandising. But event then, television rights do not command market prices because there is a broadcasting monopoly. The clubs want some of this money at least, as they are the ones putting all of the money into the game, says Xie. "There are European clubs that don't make money. Likewise, many Chinese investors are not in the game for direct profits, but rather for some intangible returns." These include greater exposure to their core businesses and access to preferential treatment from local government. But these perks have either been doled out or are no longer available, making a lot of owners anxious. And as a result, only tobacco makers are willingly in the bull pen because they are forbidden from spending on advertising. As Xie observes, club owners who are State-owned enterprises are under pressure from the State Asset Commission to spin off non-essential operations. And many private business owners have concluded that the media exposure that comes with owning a football team is not worth 40 million yuan (US$4.8 million) or so per year. Dalian President Xu looks to be the exception, as he says the exposure of his team is tantamount to 5 billion yuan (US$604 million) in advertising. Yet, he is the one who initiated the "revolution." "It would be simplistic to view the conflict between the reform-calling clubs and the domineering CFA as the good guys versus the bad guy," he said. "Everybody is acting out of his own interests." Syndicate involvement Nevertheless, there is a victim in all of this - apart from the players and others who may not be getting paid: the ordinary football fan. While clubs bleed money, an underground industry has sprung up to profit from the football mania. Casinos from Guangzhou to Macao in the south are betting heavily on Super League games. Although statistics are hard to come by, the legal sports lottery, which allows betting on European games only, brings in 20 billion yuan (US$2.4 billion) each year. "My estimate is at least half of the games this season, or half of the teams, were involved in betting scandals," said Yin Mingshan, president of a Chongqing club. "But since I don't have any proof, I'm being conservative." A Beijing Star Daily editorial said "he is way too conservative." One consequence of illegal betting is the rigging of games which, according to most press reports, is condoned by the majority of players and referees. And the Beijing paper claimed that players were getting greedy. Some of them on annual salaries of up to 3-4 million yuan (US$360,000 to US$480,000), which is much more than their South Korean counterparts, are no longer content with doubling or tripling their stake - they want returns to increase by a factor of 12 or more. To achieve that, the players "fix" the games by deliberately losing, and nowadays the odds are stacked so high that it does not take a genius to see what is going on. As it is always easier to lose a point than to score one, it is said that a player who bets on his team to win is, relatively speaking, honest. Clubs have repeated their threats of punishment, but all they can do is to attempt to cut off the players' communications with the outside world - and bookies - by taking away their mobile phones. The Beijing newspaper mentions that gambling syndicates from Indonesia have infiltrated the management of many clubs and closely monitor the moves of every player. Just as clubs can rarely obtain hard evidence of illegal activities, the CFA claims it is not fair for it to be accused of turning a blind eye to illegal betting. Its hands are tied because it cannot take over the job of law enforcement from government agencies, it insists. Chen Chengda, a 75-year-old veteran observer of Chinese football, deplores that, as long as illegal betting is rampant, the game will be doomed. According to media reports, the CFA is considering setting up a lottery that caters to Super League games as a way of taking a lot of money away from illegal gaming. It will be based on an Italian model and will offer a high rate of return. Approval from the State Sport Administration is still pending. Yet, few expect the lottery to shut out all of the problems. Fan's hopes have taken too many beatings, such as last year, when Gong Jianping, the referee at the centre of the "black whistle" scandal, was given a 10-year jail term for taking bribes of 380,000 yuan (US$46,000) from top-flight clubs for influencing the outcomes of games. Strangely though, Gong's case aroused much public sympathy as people perceived him as a whipping boy for offences that were much wider in scope and greater in severity - and that undoubtedly continue to occur. However, it seems referees, who come with a bribery price tag of about 90,000 yuan (US11,000), are not the preferred target of syndicates, where the gambling involved in one game are said to amount to tens of millions of yuan. They have become so sophisticated that some even cringe at the thought of bribing a referee as it is considered "too childish, too cheap." Road ahead In China, no business attracts as much public attention as football. Many agree that, of all the industries and topics out there, this is an area most open to media criticism and public outcry. Aside from colourful four-letter words, nearly everything can be, and has been, printed about the CFA and its administrators. "Yet nothing changes, all of the public sentiment is brushed aside," says Xie. For years, media analysts and fans became irate as the authorities ignored their feedback and went about their business as usual, in their stately ways. It has created an outpouring of sarcasm. The Beijing Star Daily's lengthy mock question and answer article with the CFA is bracketed by jokes, one of which goes: "Question: What progress has been made since China's footballers turned professional? The CFA: Before, the players and referees were not sure of their profession and did not know how to make big money - now they do." Fans are turning away from league games in droves. They are played in nearly empty stadiums and tickets sometimes sell for 2 yuan (24 US cents), or are given away for free. Watching a game is often a source of angst and despair, instead of one of excitement and inspiration. Sponsors are also becoming more hesitant. Attaching a brand name to the game can damage the good name of a brand, the Beijing paper claims. Coca-Cola has withdrawn because it was not compensated after its sponsored games did not get broadcast on television, as was agreed. Aside from the 30 million yuan (US$3.6 million) the Hyundai motor company gave Beijing Guo'an, which some interpreted as a political gesture, most clubs have been seeing a substantial drop in sponsoring revenue. Naturally, many people have already called for the disbanding of the Super League which, in its current incarnation, is only one year old. "The failure to get into any international games may be a good sign," as Xie offers an alternate view. "It forces the clubs as well as the CFA to focus on the nitty-gritty of the teams and their prowess, without disruptions and without hyped-up aspirations." Asked why football lovers cannot change their attitudes and simply take the
blemished games and sideline brouhahas as a form of entertainment, Xie says:
"People understand they live in an imperfect world, so they expect sport to be
pure and corruption-free." |
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