You might not have noticed it, but Chinese football’s player transfer window has just closed. With Argentinian international Carlos Tevez’s confessions that his brief stay with Chinese Super League side Shanghai Shenhua was a financially motivated holiday still ringing in the ears of China’s officials, this transfer window was seemingly much quieter than others during the past couple of years.
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An excitable Western audience is still preoccupied debating whether the Chinese football bubble has burst, and an array of wild transfer rumours thus continued to circulate in the media, not least of which was a “Messi to Hebei Fortune” story that refused to go away.
Yet despite the perceived inactivity, several transfers which were concluded were arguably more profound in nature than any of the big name signings we have seen in recent times. Furthermore, developments off the field during the transfer window have helped clarify where Chinese football now seems to be heading.
Argentine striker Carlos Tevez with a Shanghai Shenhua shirt. Photo: AFP
The protracted move of Congolese international Cédric Bakambu to Beijing Guoan from Spain’s Villareal became a regulatory game of cat and mouse, as the parties involved sought to avoid the overseas player tax the Chinese football authorities imposed (under instruction from China’s central government) during the middle of last year.
This attempt at tax evasion always seemed ludicrously naive given President Xi Jinping’s ongoing, muscular approach to weeding out corruption. Indeed, it was no surprise when an assertive government diktat on the issue of player tax avoidance was subsequently issued.
