takes a look at all the big Chinese news stories from the weekend so you don’t have to. National team news is at the forefront, with a big win for China over Korea, even if it was at the youth level. Note, if you haven’t competed our (short!!!) 9 question survey yet, please do so! Thanks to all who have already helped us out, responses have been great so far!
–China’s U22s beat South Korea 2-1 on Saturday, with Zhang Xizhe scoring the late winner. Guizhou’s Yang Yihu opened the scoring in the 10th minute off a rebound shot from Wu Lei. The Koreans equalized in the 25th minute and Gangnam styled it up, but it was China who was dancing in the end when local boy Zhang scored in the 91st minute.
–Not so fast Aerbin! The CFA has determined that Dalian Shide’s players will not automatically join Aerbin, instead they’re to be treated as if on a free, able to go wherever they want. This doesn’t appear to be a completely final decision, but it is an interesting development. We’ll be sure to have more on this later.
–Guangzhou Evergrande will raise its number of season tickets to around 25,000 for the new season. There season ticket will also serve as a phone card with RMB200/month on it and can be used as a Guangzhou transportation card. Beijing Guoan is also looking into making their season ticket into a transportation card. This trend of clubs looking into ways to help defray the ever raising costs of season tickets shows that they aren’t completley tone deaf to the needs of fans, a nice change.
–Two second half goals saw the US women defeat China indoors at Ford Field in Detroit on Saturday. The two sides will meet again on Wednesday in Houston.
–Guangzhou R&F is persuing one of China’s sole players abroad, Zhang Chengdong. The young Chinese international is currently on loan to Eintracht Braunschweig, though he is under contract with Portuguese side C.D. Mafra, who he first joined in 2009.
–The CSL hasn’t released the 2013 schedule yet (give it a few more months), but the season will begin on March 9. This year there will be a few multiple week breaks for international matches and an additional two week break after Round 23 at the end of August due to the National Games. The season will once again end on the first weekend of November. The China League season will start a week after the CSL and end on the same weekend in November as the top flight.
–A lot of talk about Didier Drogba, who is currently practicing with his old club, Chelsea. Most recent talks are that Juventus are looking to sign the Ivorian for US$2 million. For my money I expect any deal for Drogba will be a short term loan and that he’ll still be in Shenhua blue at the start of the 2013 season.
