2012: Rise of the Chinese Football Empire? is a post from: Just Football

Following the arrival of Nicolas Anelka and Jean Tigana at Shanghai Shenhua, the Chinese Super League (CSL) has received more attention in a month than it has previously done in almost a decade.

The CSL itself is coming up to its ninth year as China's top league since it superseded the Jia-A League in 2003.

By Andrew Crawford, writing from Shanghai. Andrew has written for The Independent and When Saturday Comes, while also maintaining Wild East Football the only English site covering Chinese football, and he'll be featuring "Letters from Shanghai" on AFR to help track the growth of the league, as well as the stars playing there.

NICOLAS Anelka's departure from Chelsea to Chinese Super League club Shanghai Shenhua got me thinking: how far the game has evolved in the world's most populous Country?

Ever since the formation of China's top flight division in 1994 and its subsequent re-branding 10 years later (From the Jia-A League to the Chinese Super League), the far-east nation has pumped vast sums of money into its Football Association and the results of this are now beginning to show.

Liverpool will welcome two young Asian players to Merseyside as part of the Chinese Football Association's 'Future Star' program in January.
Long Cheng [16], and Chen Xiaomao [14], will link up with the Reds Youth Academy following a successful week-long trial at Melwood last month.
Frank McParland, director of the Liverpool academy revealed how the club had been extremely impressed with the youngsters during their first visit, praising their commitment and professionalism.

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.

Kickoff from Guangdong Provincial People's Stadium at 1:00PM GMT, 8:00AM EST

Ways to Watch:

Live on ESPNUK in England and FSC in America, as well as on LFCtv online for those with a season pass.

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Guangdong:

It's six weeks since the close of the 2010-11 season, and Liverpool's already set to kick off 2011-12 with a preseason visit to Guangzhou to face Guangdong Sunray Cave.

The Chinese Football Association's National Team will return to the screens of China Central Television after the state-owned broadcaster signed a three-and-half year contract with the CFA's commercial partner, China Football Industry Development Company/World Sport Group. CCTV's engagement with CFA Team China will begin with the FIFA World Cup 2014 qualifying match against Laos in Kunming on

According to the Chinese Football Association, China had more than 650,000 players under the age of 18 registered in the early 1990s. That number plummeted to 7,000 at the end of last year. In comparison, Japan has 500,000. "Nowadays, I think there are at most 10 out of a thousand schools in China that support students to play soccer," China's former national football captain, Hao Haidong, told

Wang Jianlin, chairman of Dalian Wanda real estate company, has agreed to hand over 500 million yuan to the Chinese Football Association to fund youth programmes, referee training and foreign coaching, the China Daily said.

Under a three-year deal signed Sunday, Wang Jianlin, chairman of Dalian Wanda real estate company, agreed to hand over 500 million yuan to the Chinese Football Association (CFA) to fund youth programmes, referee training and foreign coaching, the China Daily said.

The Chinese Football Association has apologised for its Olympic team's early exit from the 2012 London Olympics qualifying rounds. "We are sorry that the Chinese U-23 team missed the opportunity to claim a berth at the London Olympics after losing to Oman," the CFA said in a newsletter posted on its official website as quoted by China Daily.

Chinese company Dalian Wanda is set to provide considerable financial support to Chinese soccer through a comprehensive agreement with the Chinese Football Association (CFA)

Well-travelled French football manager Philippe Troussier has offered advice to the Chinese Football Association on creating a new environment for football in the world's most populace country. "Is soccer a great event in China? I'm not sure," he told the China Daily, adding that, in Europe 80% of attendees go to the stadium just because they want to attend a match, like going to a movie or a

U.S. head coach Pia Sundhage was the assistant coach for the China team at the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup, which they hosted. Every time Pia has returned to China since then, she has proved to be a very popular person with many media members wanting to speak with her, mostly about China, the Chinese team, what the Chinese team can do to get better, why China isn't better, why she left China, will she be back to China.