Association football baseball club in Shanghai, China

football club
Shanghai Shenhua F.C. ( chinese : 上海申花足球俱乐部 ) is a chinese professional football club that participates in the chinese Super League under license from the Chinese Football Association ( CFA ). The term shen hua literally translates as “ the Flower of Shanghai ” in English – shen is one of the alternative names of Shanghai and hua means flower in Chinese. The team is based in Kangqiao, Shanghai and their home stadium is the Hongkou Football Stadium, which has a seat capacity of 33,060. Their majority stockholder is chinese real-estate developer Greenland Group who took over the operation of the club when they bought the 28.5 % parcel from former majority stockholder Zhu Jun in 2014. [ 1 ]

The club ‘s predecessor was the municipal-run semi-pro cabaret Shanghai F.C.. The team predominantly played in the top tier, where they won several domestic league and cup titles. On 10 December 1993 the club was reorganized to become a wholly professional football cabaret so they could play in the 1994 chinese Jia-A League season making them one of the founding members of the first fully professional top-tier league in China. Since then, they have won one league title and three Chinese FA Cups. [ 2 ] According to Forbes, Shenhua are the 6th most valuable football team in China, with a team value of $ 106 million, and an calculate tax income of $ 29 million in 2015. [ 3 ]

history [edit ]

early club [edit ]

Shanghai Shenhua ‘s harbinger was originally called East China, a team name used as far back as 1910 for the football in the multi-sport consequence Chinese National Games. [ 4 ] The local Shanghai politics sports body decided to use this name for their new club founded on 1 November 1951 to take part in China ‘s first amply nationalized national football league tournament where they finished second in the league that year. [ 5 ] The football league gradually expanded and the team were allowed to name themselves after their own province of Shanghai in 1957. soon afterwards by 1961, Shanghai started to establish themselves as a major football team within China when they won their first league style. [ 6 ] This was then cursorily followed by their second league title in 1962, however in 1966 because of the chinese Cultural Revolution, football in China was halted and Shanghai were unable to play. When football returned in China, Shanghai were able to return to the top grade, however they were unable to regain any of the laterality that they had previously shown and were evening relegated in 1980. [ 7 ] Though they were able to be cursorily promoted in the follow season, they spent many years without actually winning any titles until Wang Houjun led them to win the chinese FA Cup in 1991, which was their first trophy in 29 years. [ 8 ]

professionalism [edit ]

Throughout the 1990s, the Chinese Football Association were demanding more professionalism from their football teams and while many were semi-professional, Shanghai would be one of the first when they gathered sponsorship from Yu Zhifei and the local caller named Shenhua ( “ Flower of Shanghai ” ) on 10 December 1993, founding Shanghai Shenhua. [ 8 ] This then saw Shanghai hire their first professional coach in Xu Genbao, who was the former China national team director in 1994. The motivate would quickly see Shanghai win the second professional football league title by the end of the 1995 league season. [ 9 ] When Xu left, Shanghai attempted to bring in several extraneous coaches to add more know to the team, however few achieved any achiever despite being near on several occasions, except for Muricy Ramalho ‘s brief spell when the club won the 1998 Chinese FA Cup. By the end of 2001, the Shenhua group ended their sponsorship of the club and were replaced with SVA and the Shanghai Media & Entertainment Group. The clubhouse changed its name to Shanghai Shenhua SVA SMEG Football Club. The team however remained singular as it still retains “ Shenhua ” in its name, whereas many other teams drop the name of their erstwhile sponsors completely. On the deliver, the club would take over Shanghai Cable 02, a young person football team set up by Xu Genbao while besides bringing in a fresh coach in Wu Jingui, who built a new team predominantly using many from the Shanghai Cable team and despite struggling in his debut season, he was able to win the league deed in 2003. [ 10 ] Critics would dispute the authenticity of the deed win after it was discovered in 2011 that the referee Lu Jun was bribed by the steer of the CFA ‘s referee arrangements, Zhang Jianqiang, to be biased towards Shenhua in a vital meet against Shanghai International in a plot that Shenhua won 4–1. [ 11 ] Lu Jun and Zhang Jianqiang were both formally charged with match-fixing, while Shenhua ‘s general director Lou Shifang was discovered to be the person who orchestrated the bribe. initially despite this indiscretion, the club was spared any disciplinary carry through. [ 12 ] The reason provided by the CFA at the time for the indulgence was that they would be punishing the individuals who put the game in disrepute and not the club ; because Lou Shifang was Shenhua ‘s offending player and had left the club several years before the allegations were confirmed, it would have been coarse to punish the club retrospectively. [ 13 ] On 18 February 2013 The CFA would decide to change its judgment on Shenhua and retrospectively decided to punish the club by revoking its 2003 league deed, fining the club with 1 million Yuan and giving a 6-point deduction at the beginning of the 2013 Chinese Super League temper after it was discovered that they besides fixed another game against Shaanxi Guoli en road to winning the 2003 league claim. [ 14 ] [ 15 ]

Zhu Jun earned run average [edit ]

In 2007, the owner of inner-city rival of Shanghai United, Zhu Jun and his company The9 Limited bought a majority share of Shanghai Shenhua and began to merge Shanghai United into Shanghai Shenhua. His first act was to replace the previously successful existing head coach Wu Jingui with Shanghai United ‘s Osvaldo Giménez. [ 16 ] The appointment was to prove highly disruptive and Wu Jingui was cursorily brought back as the head coach after merely a few months, but was sacked on 9 September 2008. Jia Xiuquan took over his position on the same day. [ 17 ] This was followed by the club adding to their backroom staff when on 1 January 2009 Shenhua made taiwanese football history by becoming the beginning chinese team to hire a extraneous CEO and a technical film director when on 1 January 2009, the clubhouse hired former coach Osvaldo Gimenez as their chief executive officeholder. [ 18 ] One day late, erstwhile PSV Eindhoven technical director Stan Valckx joined Shenhua in the like position. [ 19 ]
After a disappointing 2011 temper in the chinese Super League, Zhu Jun decided to bring in a marquee actor, thus on 12 December 2011 it was confirmed that Chelsea striker Nicolas Anelka would be arriving in Shanghai in January 2012, while six days late it was announced that his compatriot Jean Tigana would be the oral sex coach from the 2012 season. Tigana was fired after a drawstring of poor results and was replaced by former Argentina national team passenger car Sergio Batista to lead the team. After a successful season act for Chelsea and winning the 2011–12 UEFA Champions League, Ivorian striker Didier Drogba signed a two-and-a-half-year deal with Shenhua. [ 20 ] This was soon followed by the sign of colombian external football player Giovanni Moreno from argentine club Racing Club. These signings were intended to boost the club ‘s entitle challenge and see Zhu Jun ‘s investment within the club reach 150 million Yuan, which he believed gave him a controlling interest of 70 per penny as promised by the other shareholders. When the other shareholders decided not to agree to this placement, Zhu Jun decided to pull his financing of the club, which resulted in the team finish in a disappoint ninth place and both Anelka and Drogba leaving the club. [ 21 ] The relationship between Zhu Jun and the other shareholders became tied more fractious at the beginning of the 2013 league season when the chinese FA issued the baseball club with a six-point subtraction for match-fixing ten years prior and a fine of one million yuan. This would lead to a stockholder quarrel between the other shareholders SVA, Shanghai Media Group, Shanghai Electric Group and Huangpu SASAC on who should pay for this fine, which saw a gap in the club finances that saw Rolando Schiavi, Patricio Toranzo and Giovanni Moreno garbage to play the 31 March 2013 league game against Liaoning Whowin because of unpaid wages. [ 22 ]

greenland [edit ]

The Zhu Jun era ended on 31 January 2014 when the golf club was purchased by Greenland Holding Group Company Limited. [ 1 ] On 6 February 2014, Greenland Holding Group Company Limited announced that the club ‘s official name would be changed to “ Shanghai Greenland FC, Shanghai Greenland Shenhua team ” and it was hoped that by retaining Shenhua within the official team diagnose it would appease the fans by reflecting on the cabaret ‘s heritage. [ 23 ] [ 24 ] This did not work. subsequent badge alterations which eliminated Shenhua from the team ‘s logo drew significant criticism from many of the golf club ‘s supporters, who publicly voiced their dissatisfaction on 9 March 2014 during the league bet on against Shanghai Shenxin as they saw removing Shenhua from the club ‘s appoint as a tarnish on the team ‘s inheritance and history. [ 25 ] On 18 July 2014 the club bowed to pressure from their supporters when they officially released a new team badge, which brought Shenhua back into the team logo and subsequently changed the club ‘s name to “ Shanghai Greenland Shenhua Football Club ”. [ 26 ] On 3 February 2015, three days after the australian national football team won the AFC Asian Cup, Tim Cahill announced he had been signed by the Shenhua, moving from the New York Red Bulls [ 27 ] Despite signing a annual compress extension in November 2015, Tim Cahill announced on his Instagram on 16 February 2016 that his contract had been terminated by incoming coach, Gregorio Manzano. [ 28 ] No reason was given for his end point beyond saying that he was “ not contribution of the new coach Manzano ‘s plans for the 2016 season … ” [ 29 ] Shanghai Shenhua won the 2019 Chinese FA Cup beating Shandong Luneng 3–0 at a jammed Hongkou Stadium on 6 Dec 2019, making it a 3–1 aggregate victory for the Blues. It is the fifth clock Shenhua have lifted the trophy, and the irregular time in three years, after their 2017 Chinese FA Cup victory over city equal Shanghai SIPG. [ 30 ] In 2021, the CFA launched its “ achromatic name campaign ”, requiring professional clubs to switch to names that do not mention their sponsors. The baseball club, though always had been publicly recognized as “ Shenhua ”, had different patron prefixes and suffixes ( such as “ Greenland Shenhua ” and “ Shenhua SVA ” ) in the last thirty years. Responding to the call for achromatic names, the club owner, Greenland, restored the diagnose of the club to “ Shanghai Shenhua F.C. ” without prefixes or suffixes on February 9, 2021 .

Rivalries [edit ]

Shenhua ‘s fiercest and oldest competition is against Beijing Guoan and is often referred to as the China Derby. [ 31 ] The competition with Beijing is viewed as a manifestation of the competition that exists between the two most important cities in the area, as one is the center of government while the other is the fiscal center of modern department of commerce within China. [ 32 ] Each cabaret had an extensive history including successful periods. however, they rarely competed immediately for trophies until the 1997 league temper. With Shenhua having won the 1995 league championship and Beijing having won the 1996 Chinese FA Cup both teams looked as if they had the lineage to win trophies that season and on 20 July 1997 in a vital league game, Beijing thrashed Shenhua 9–1 at the Workers Stadium in Beijing. [ 33 ] It would be Beijing ‘s largest victory and Shenhua ‘s greatest kill ever recorded. soon after that event both teams would meet again in the 1997 FA Cup concluding, which saw Beijing win the cup. [ 34 ]

When professionalism was established in 1994 within the chinese leagues it opened the door for more than one team within each city. This finally paved the way for the first always taiwanese top-flight city bowler hat, which took put in 2002 when Shanghai Shenhua lost 2–0 to Shanghai Zhongyuan ( late renamed Inter ) in movement of a sold out Hongkou Football Stadium. Known as the Shanghai bowler hat it would be the beginning of an intense but short competition between the two clubs, which reached its bill on the final day of the 2003 league temper with both teams within reach of winning the league entitle. [ 35 ] Shenhua won their game while Inter surprisingly lost theirs to relegation fighting club Tianjin Kangshifu. This attend critics dispute the title succeed and it was finally discovered that both teams had players and officials match-fix games throughout the campaign. [ 15 ] Shenhua would retrospectively lose their entitle while the Inter owners decided it was financially unviable to remain in Shanghai and relocated their team to Xi’an, which effectively ended the competition. [ 36 ] With Inter Shanghai leaving the city Shenhua experienced another one of these Shanghai derbies when Shanghai United were promoted in the 2006 league temper. The competition between the two teams never reached the same saturation as what was experienced against Inter because United had only recently relocated to the city and were building their fan base. [ 35 ] Any growth of a competition was ultimately cut light when Zhu Jun took over both teams and merged them in concert with Shenhua keeping their name. In 2012 Shanghai Shenxin moved to the city revitalizing the bowler hat, however it was the promotion of Shanghai SIPG in 2013 that caught to fans imagination because they were formed by Xu Genbao who had previously managed Shenhua. [ 35 ] The club ‘s geographic placement has besides opened them up to rivalries with neighbouring club ‘s Hangzhou Greentown and Jiangsu Suning where they contest in a fixture called the Yangtze Delta Derby. [ 37 ] late, with the delegating of Shanghai Shenxin in 2015 and then disbandment in 2020, Shanghai SIPG became the sole rival for Shenhua in Shanghai. The contest reached its acme when Shenhua drum SIPG in the 2017 Chinese FA Cup finals on aggregate and when SIPG won the ace league soon after in 2018. The competition between the fans and the players made the fresh Shanghai bowler hat arguably the most stimulate bowler hat in China. besides, in 2020, with Jiangsu Suning lifting the domestic league, Jiangsu fans escalated the crosstown competition by renting a billboard showcasing Jiangsu ‘s trophy barely outside the Hongkou Stadium, Shenhua ‘s dwelling venue. This act of aggravation incited massive call on the carpet from the Shenhua fans, resulting in the ad being removed the day after. however, though fierce the competition might be through the years, it concluded with Jiangsu Suning ‘s dissolving in 2021. [ 38 ]

Players [edit ]

First team squad [edit ]

As of 31 July 2021[39]

notice : Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality .

Reserve squad [edit ]

Updated 1 March 2019
note : Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality .

Unregistered players [edit ]

note : Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality .

Out on loanword [edit ]

note : Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality .

Coaching staff [edit ]

As of 3 February 2020[40]

managerial history [edit ]

Managers who have coached the club and team since Shanghai Shenhua became a professional club back in 1993. [ 48 ] [ 49 ]

Honours [edit ]

all-time honours list including semi-professional Shanghai period. [ 50 ] [ 51 ]

First team [edit ]

Domestic titles

Winners (5): 1956, 1991, 1998, 2017, 2019
Winners (3): 1995, 1998, 2001

International titles

Winners (1): 2007

Reserve team [edit ]

  • National Reserve League
Winners (1): 2004

young person academy [edit ]

  • National Youth League U19
Winners (1): 2014
  • National Youth League U17
Winners (1): 2018
  • National Youth League Champions Cup U17
Winners (1): 2018

Results [edit ]

All-time League Rankings

  • Updated 11 November 2018.[52][53]
  • No league games in 1959, 1966–72, 1975; Shanghai did not compete for position because they were hosts in 1965; 1974 only played in group stage before touring Africa.
  • ^1^2^3^4^5

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