Why the Chinese Super League?

The Chinese Super league first came to the existence in 2004.At first it was just a normal low tier league which was trying to make its own mark in Asian football. It was trying to emulate the success and the standards set by the top European leagues. Initially it was started with the vision to allow more homegrown/local players play in the league with a motive to allow football in China to grow and recognize. While the motive and the ambition were very real, the success was hard to come as people were more interested in the already established top leagues. It also lead to lack of sponsors and commercial success for the clubs prying their trade in the league.

It was 2nd July,2011 when China really gave a demo of their financial prowess to the world when they signed Conca for a then world record fee of US$10m with Conca earning a salary of  US$10 and it saw him earning at par with Ronaldo and Messi. Now five and a half years later, Oscar and tevez are latest out of the lot of huge contingency of players moving to China for a sum that can really make one relate football to some freak reality show. Some of the top names to have made the switch in the valley of the Dragons include the likes of Drogba,Tevez, Carlos Martinez,Oscar,Hulk,Renato Augusto,Graziano pelle and to name a few.

While it is understandable for players like Drogba or Tevez as they are moving towards twilight of their careers, its really shocking for the other players who have quit some of the top clubs like Chelsea, Athletico Madrid etc when they were in the prime and playing their best game. Its really easy to understand how important money has become for the modern footballers for which they are giving up the chance to play in some of the premier football leagues and competitions like the Champions league or the Barclays Premier league.

Xi Jonping, the Chinese president has a vision to transform his nation to a football super-power with an ambition to qualify and win the world cup. A huge amount of money has been invested to the very primitive level with an aim to establish 50,000 football specialty school to grow and develop the home based. Without any doubt, all these development and the chance to share the field with some of the top international players will give the Chinese players a huge amount of exposure. But it is also very easy to make one thing that all these money and the fanfare are aimed at to bring about more and more commercial success of the league to the stakeholders and an opportunity for the players roped in from the other leagues/countries to earn more money and make a living for themselves. Though it is something that people will always debate on and really difficult to put a lid on it.

Looking at the future it can be only said that the interest in this league will only grow with time. Everyday in the tabloids or in the papers, we can see a host of big names linked with a move to China. Players like Wayne Rooney or Yaya Toure have been linked with big money moves and it will be not surprising to see one of them giving up to such vast riches on offer. And only recently there have been many stories which were linking Ronaldo with a US$317 million move to a Chinese club, which really really sounds insane considering such a huge preposterous amount involved. And if football transfer histories taught us anything, it is always better to expect something really big and out of imagination to happen.

In  a way it is really saddening to see players from all these top leagues moving to China and hence gradually shifting the power. As a traditional football fan, I still want the big grand daddy teams to really battle it out with their hearts and souls and keep up the spirit of this beautiful game which we all cherish.