The 2023 Professional League Club Leaders Meeting and Summit of Heads of Chinese Super League, China League A and China B Clubs will be held at the Xianghe National Team Base on February 7. During the meeting, the Chinese Football Association and the Preparatory Committee of the Chinese Football Federation will solicit opinions from clubs on the new season league access policy, league registration, and participation policy plan, and interpret the detailed rules of the policy plan. "Restoring normal order in the league and maintaining a stable environment in the league" is the main goal of the work of the Chinese Super League and domestic professional leagues at all levels in the 2023 season.
The Beijing Youth Daily reporter learned that it is precisely from the "maintenance of stability" that the Chinese Football Association and the preparatory team of the Chinese Football Federation will not make significant adjustments to the policies of the professional league in the new season, except for the "U23 local player policy" that is likely to be abolished, the remaining policies will basically remain unchanged. The "pay limit policy" that has been in place since the 2021 season will continue to be applied.
Last week, the Chinese Football Association sent the clubs of the Chinese Super League, China League A and China B "Notice on Convening the 2023 Meeting of Club Leaders of Professional Leagues". It shows above that in order to do a good job in the preparations before the start of the 2023 season of the Chinese Super League, China A and China B League, the Chinese Football Association and the Preparatory Group of the Chinese Football Federation plan to hold a working meeting of the main responsible persons of the third-level league clubs. The content of the meeting was respectively related to "matters related to the league access policy; Matters related to league registration and participation policies; League business-related matters; other matters".
The Beiqing News reporter learned that in view of the fact that the domestic league has experienced three extraordinary seasons in a row due to objective factors, during which both the event organizers, clubs and all relevant parties of the league have experienced unprecedented challenges and difficulties, and the normal order of the league has also been disrupted to a certain extent. To this end, the top priority of the Chinese Super League and domestic professional leagues at all levels in the 2023 season is undoubtedly to fully restore the normal operation of the competition, fully restore the home-and-away system, and the reasonable arrangement of the competition schedule, attract fans to return to the game scene, and restore the vitality and vitality of the league.
Of course, an important prerequisite for the league to get back on track is that the league environment is effectively managed. Among them, it is particularly important to combat and curb chaos such as club wage arrears. The reason why the Chinese Football Association and the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation held a league work meeting at this time is also to further emphasize that no matter how difficult the operation of the league and clubs is, the problem of "arrears of wages" that has plagued all parties for a long time must be solved, so the organizers of the event have prepared the worst for the "downsizing" of the Chinese Super League and the Chinese League One, and even designed the schedule and closing time of the new season of the Chinese Super League with "16 teams participating" or "18 teams participating" respectively. This means that the Chinese Football Association and the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation will confirm the scale of the leagues at all levels in the new season in accordance with the principle of "rather lack than abuse".
In fact, the main problems affecting the preparatory process at all levels of the new season are focused on the reform of the club's shares and the issue of salary arrears. Some clubs are in the deep financial or debt crisis, and hesitate between "retreating" and "not retreating", so the organizers of the event reserve time for them to solve the problem from the practical point of view, and even consider conditionally relaxing the "long-distance transfer" restrictions for China A and China B clubs, but no matter how the organizer understands and cooperates, completely resolving the remaining wage arrears and contract disputes is the "bottom line" that the club's access "clearance" cannot break through.
After extraordinary times or difficult times, whether the domestic professional league can regain its vitality after respite is actually the focus of the event organizers, clubs and fans. It is precisely in consideration of the actual situation and difficulties that the Chinese Football Association and the Chinese Football Federation decided to maintain the "stability" of various league policies in the new season after investigation and solicitation of opinions from relevant parties. It is reported that as in the same as last season, the introduction of local players in the Chinese Super League, China A and China B will not be subject to quota restrictions, and the foreign aid policy is likely to remain unchanged. As for the U23 local player policy, which has been implemented for 6 seasons, after communication with all parties, it is likely to be abolished because it is determined to "do more harm than good".
In recent days, rumors about the "Chinese Super League further salary limit" have attracted attention from all parties. However, according to a considerable number of club representatives, they have not received an agenda notice about the Xianghe meeting to study this aspect of the content adjustment. A representative of the event organizer confirmed to the Beiqing News reporter that "the content of salary limit is not included in the scope of discussion at this meeting." It is reported that considering that the main problem plaguing professional leagues at all levels is "salary arrears", for the "salary limit", the Chinese Football Association and the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation will continue to use the "enhanced salary limit order" launched since the 2021 season. Specific to Chinese Super League clubs, the total investment of each company in a single season must not exceed 600 million yuan, the total salary of local players must not exceed 75 million yuan, and the total salary of foreign players must not exceed 10 million euros. The maximum salary for local players is limited to 5 million RMB before tax, and the maximum salary for foreign players is 3 million euros before tax. The average annual salary of local players shall not exceed RMB 3 million before tax, and the average annual salary of foreign players shall not exceed 1.5 million euros.
It is understood that although some clubs have a relatively strong demand for "further salary limit" due to their own operational difficulties, in fact, the vast majority of clubs have encountered varying degrees of operational difficulties in the past three seasons, and the investment in recruitment has decreased significantly year by year. New Chinese Super League signings such as the "Shenfeng" Kante introduced by the Cangzhou Lions in the middle of last season, even landed in the Chinese Super League with zero transfer price, and some Chinese Super League foreign signings even cost only about $100,000 a season. Therefore, even if there is no external policy to limit it, most clubs have returned to rationality in terms of signings, and the trend of "throttling" or "following the monetary root" may continue into the 2023 season and beyond.
In addition, according to the current "salary limit order", each club's single-quarter investment and domestic and foreign aid salary input have been "capped", which means that each family can independently choose new signings in the low, medium and high price segments within the scope allowed by the "investment cap". Since the new season of the Chinese Super League will start as early as mid-to-late April, most clubs have already started the search for new signings at this moment, and some have even entered the critical period of negotiation or signing, if the sudden adjustment of the restriction order at this time will inevitably adversely affect these cooperation, and even add chaos to the clubs, which is also contrary to the original intention of the tournament organizers to restore the order of the league and maintain the stability of the league environment. It can be seen that it is a relatively rational choice to keep the salary limit order unchanged for the time being.
Text/Beiqing Sports Xiao Zhao
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