Etoile FC were allowed to play two seasons in the S-League despite having failed to provide the full $500,000 banker's guarantee that foreign clubs have to put up, it is believed.

That is one reason why the club, facing debts 'a few times more' than the $100,000 that has been reported, has been struggling to repay money owed to players from last season.

By Andrew Crawford, writing from Shanghai

Despite the city starting to slow down for the Chinese New Year, Shanghai Shenhua's PR machine remains as busy as ever. The club's website is more brightly coloured than usual and images of the new manager, Jean Tigana, and his star player, Nicolas Anelka, flicker across the screen whilst behind them, four silhouetted figures stand in the background.

First of all I should start this piece by wishing everybody a happy new year! I've been enjoying myself over the Christmas holiday and have neglected the blog over the last few days so I need to rectify this, starting off with a piece regarding the new Emperor's Cup winners in Japan.

FC Tokyo have done an unlikely league and cup double in Japan following their 4-2 triumph over Kyoto Sanga in last Sunday's Emperor's Cup final.

The 2011 Chinese Super League has reached the two-thirds stage and the fate of this season's newcomers Ghangzhou Evergrande and Chengdu Blades is one of stark contrast. The former, who won promotion last season as League One winners, are the team that currently leads the way in the Chinese Super League whilst the latter are, like most promoted sides, struggling at the bottom of the 16 team league.

So what are people saying after last night's brawl before the Hougang United v Etoile SLeague which saw the game cancelled before the kick off.
The SLeague website comes out with the usual spiel about taking a serious view blah blah blah. The FA took a serious view last year of a similar incident between Young Lions and Beijing Guoan, those lengthy suspensions saw players miss out on the AFF Cup and obviously no lessons have been learned.

The SLeague are at it again. So often they make decisions to appease the court of public opinion rather than for the good of the game.
Last year, after a brawl between players from Young Lions and Beijing Guoan, the FAS slapped heavy fines and lengthy bans on players from both sides in response to a media outcry.

Brawls happen. Sometimes they seem to happen a bit more frequently in ertain places, but they happen on every level at some point. Tis the nature of the competitive beast.

A junior brawl erupted in Florida last week, the scale of the scrum proportional to the level itselt twas a high school game.

With the SLeague due to start in a couple of weeks fans in Singapore expecting great changes following a disappointing 2010 are likely to be disappointed. Tanjong Pagar have returned to replace Beijing Guan but that's about it. Weekend games aren't being scheduled because they clash with English premier League, talk about an insecurity complex emanating from FAS headquarters!

Po Hui is claiming on his Twitter thing that Tanjung Pagar will join the SLeague for 2011 after a break of a few years. They replace Beijing Guoan who decided to do what the other Chinese teams have done in Singapore and leave after one miserable season.

Former SLeague side Tanjung Pagar are considering a return to the SLeague according to this report. But would the SLeague, with their expressed penchant for foreign clubs, last year they decided to let in Beijing Guoan rather than Yishun Super Reds with disasterous results, be willing to let them back?