With four games of the Chinese Super League to go, Chengdu Rongcheng needed just a point to clinch their first title. With one game to go, they still need a point. What was a formality has become a formidable task.
The biggest bottle job in Asian football history is very much on and it would be as popular as it would be dramatic. The coach of the Sichuan club, the former Portsmouth and Coventry striker John Aloisi, has seen a 12-point lead over Dalian Yingbo cut to just three before Sunday’s showdowns. Whatever happens, this is a positive and thrilling end to a season that started negatively – literally – with nine of the 16 top-tier clubs kicking off on minus points.
They had been punished as part of a “special campaign to crack down on match-fixing, gambling and corruption in the football industry”, said a joint statement from the Chinese Football Association, the Ministry of Public Security and the General Administration of Sport at the time. Chengdu were one of the seven to start on zero, above the defending champions, Shanghai Port, who lost five points and the runners-up, Shanghai Shenhua, who were hit with 10. It robbed the usual favourites of energy and it was all a bit surreal.
It almost felt over as soon as it started with Chengdu opening up a big lead, dropping just two points from the first 12 games while the usual powers struggled to get going. Chengdu is a major city more known for its fiery Sichuan cuisine, genteel temples and cute pandas than football, despite English attempts to change that. In 2006, Sheffield United bought a local club but the Chengdu Blades were eventually dissolved in 2015.
Four years later, City Football Group bought a stake in Sichuan Jiuniu but then moved the club to the southern city of Shenzhen in 2024. Chengdu Rongcheng were formed in 2018, coming up through the divisions to finally, this season, be within touching distance of the championship. But just two wins from the last 13 and three straight defeats mean the leaders are not limping to the line but have collapsed right next to it.
It should have been over weeks ago. On 10 October, more than 40,000 fans were ready to celebrate the title but an added-time goal from Alberto Quiles gave Tianjin Jinmen Tiger a 1-0 win and postponed the celebrations. Next up was a trip to Shanghai Port but that ended in a 3-0 defeat.
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