Compared with the Football Association, what changes can the Chinese Football Federation bring to the Chinese professional league?

Reporter Chen Yong reports The long-awaited new governing body of the Chinese Professional Football League, the China Professional Football Clubs Federation (hereinafter referred to as the "Chinese Football Federation"), is expected to be officially established this week, which is a major change in the management system of the Chinese professional league. So, what changes will the new Chinese Football Federation bring to Chinese football?

The establishment of the Chinese Football Federation is actually a major change in China's football management system. After that, in 2015, the General Office of the State Council issued the "Overall Plan for the Reform and Development of Chinese Football", which clearly stated that "the establishment of a professional league council with independent legal personality is responsible for organizing and managing the professional league".

From the 2021 season to the 2024 season, the professional league is operated by the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation, but due to multiple factors, the Chinese Football Federation has never been officially implemented.

This time, the Chinese Football Federation can finally officially land, and it has now entered the countdown stage. After the formal establishment of the Chinese Football Federation, the most significant changes in itself are: although the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation has operated a professional league for 4 seasons, the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation is more like a subordinate unit of the Chinese Football Association in a sense, the Chinese Football Association has a strong right to speak, and the operation mechanism of the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation is also under the overall management of the Chinese Football Association;The Chinese Football Federation, which was established this time, will be completely separated from the Chinese Football Association and officially become an independent body with the same status as the Chinese Football Association and operating in parallel.

Of course, the Chinese Football Federation still has to accept the supervision of the Chinese Football Association at the corresponding levels such as competition style and discipline, finance, etc., including the registration work is also the responsibility of the Football Association, and the Chinese Football Federation must accept the supervision and guidance of the General Administration of Sports of the People's Republic of China.

The newly established Chinese Football Federation, its main body is the Council, the news shows that the council members are 18 people, of which the third-level professional league clubs have 9 seats, that is, the Super League has 4 seats, the Chinese League has won 3 seats, the second has won 2 seats, and the professional clubs have reached 50% of the seats on the council, and the maintenance of the club's rights and interests has also been recognized by all parties in the process of preparing for the Chinese Football Federation.

So far, the main person in charge of the Chinese Football Federation has basically locked up Li Kemin, head of the preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation, and Yang Xu, vice chairman of the Chinese Football Association.

Although the previous preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation had corresponding functional departments, most of them were at the level of competition management. After the formal establishment of the Chinese Football Federation, its internal operating mechanism will be completely different from the previous preparatory group of the Chinese Football Federation, which is mainly reflected in two aspects:First, the construction of the functional committees of the Chinese Football Federation will be the focus, and the number of functional committees set up by the Chinese Football Federation has not yet been disclosed, but some of the functions originally undertaken by the Chinese Football Association will be transferred to the Chinese Football Federation, such as disciplinary punishment in professional leagues, including arbitration in professional leagues. Second, the third-level professional leagues will have their own councils, which will play an important role in the management of league competitions at their respective levels.

It should be noted that the national level is very determined to promote the establishment of the Chinese Football Federation, and in the process of its establishment, a comprehensive consultation has been carried out on its responsibilities, functions and authority, and very detailed adjustments have been made, and a schedule for the promotion of the work of the Chinese Football Federation has been set up. Among them, the official landing of the Chinese Football Federation has been given priority, but because the time is very tight, the Chinese Football Federation needs to be sorted out and improved at three levels:First, the division of responsibilities and rights with the General Administration of Sports of the People's Republic of China and the Chinese Football Association; Second, the construction of various functional committees, including the internal operating mechanism, still needs a certain amount of time to sort out and improve; Third, in the process of the operation of the Chinese Football Federation, it still needs time to find the shortcomings and optimize them.

Normally, the optimization of the internal operation mechanism of the Chinese Football Federation, as well as the division of responsibilities and rights with the General Administration of Sports of China and the Chinese Football Association, may require a full season to run in. On the contrary, at the competition level, the previous preparatory team of the Chinese Football Federation has 4 years of experience, and the league policy is basically stable, which is relatively simple and will not affect the normal operation of the professional league in the 2025 season.

On the whole, after the official establishment of the Chinese Football Federation, the level of the league management body has been significantly improved, which is very important for the protection of professional league policies and the stability of professional league policies. In addition, the Chinese Football Federation's protection of the club's rights and interests is still relatively clear, and the club is expected to gain more right to speak.

There is no doubt that considering the destructive power of Jinyuan football to the professional league, considering the corruption and fake gambling in the field of professional leagues, the financial balance policy is the focus of supervision to ensure the financial sustainability of professional leagues, and the supervision of corruption and fake gambling is the focus, including the corresponding judicial supervision.

In fact, for the Chinese Football Professional League, in the past two or three decades, the competition level has always been the focus, and many policies have come into being, such as the cancellation of relegation and relegation 20 years ago, such as the national brand that the leadership of the Chinese Football Association has been trying to promote and the league to make way for the national brand, such as the increase and decrease of foreign aid places, and of course, the U23 policy.

In a sense, the new policies for professional leagues, except for some financial policies such as salary limit orders and recruitment adjustment fees, as well as gender-neutral names and relocation policies, other policies are carried out around the competition level, for the simple reason that all parties hope to improve the level of the league through the adjustment of competition policies, and then improve the level of national teams. The crux of the problem is that the repeated policy adjustments have overdrawn the vitality of the league, which has not only greatly affected the league, but also caused the national brand to be in trouble for a while.

In fact, there are inherent rules at the competition level of professional leagues, and some of the rules have little to do with national conditions, but more of the basic laws of football. The most important thing in the competition policy of the professional league is to maintain stability, only stability has direction, and repeated changes and tosses are easy to lose direction.

For now, the competition policy for the 2025 season has remained largely stable, giving the club a clearer direction in the preparation process. Of course, there is still a lot of work to be done before the league starts, including the official registration rules and schedule.

The newly established Chinese Football Federation, the club in the rules of the competition is still relatively high, foreign aid policy for example, in the new season of the Super League foreign aid policy plan, there is last season's "7655" option, there are also adjusted "6555" options, of course, also include the option to increase foreign aid. But after the club's discussion, they chose the "6555" option, from the previous cumulative registration of 7 people, the first window registration of 6 people, the league registration of 5 people, and the simultaneous appearance of 5 people, to the cumulative registration of 6 people, the first window registration of 5 people, the registration of 5 people, and the simultaneous appearance of 5 people.

Theoretically speaking, "7655" is more reasonable, the club has 2 adjustment places in the second transfer period, but the club finally chose "6555", and there is only 1 adjustment place in the second transfer period, which is actually to reduce the burden, and the process of the final establishment of this policy highlights the club's right to speak.

In fact, the most important thing in the rules of the competition is stability, and on the basis of stability, according to the development trend of world football and the development process of Chinese football, small adjustments can be made. In other words, the work at the competition level, as long as the league policy is stable, the other work has rules to follow and is procedural. Of course, as far as the 2025 season is concerned, because the Chinese Football Federation has just been established, the relevant work needs a process of sorting out, and perhaps more energy needs to be invested.

As far as the future development of the Chinese Football Federation is concerned, competition should not be the core of the Chinese Football Federation, commercial operations and financial supervision are the real core, and the two complement each other.

At the operational level, the current problems faced by the Chinese Football Federation include but are not limited to the operation mode of the Chinese Football Federation, the share composition of the Chinese Football Federation, whether the rights and interests of future equipment sponsors will be decentralized, how to deal with the recruitment adjustment fee, whether the team naming restrictions will be relaxed, and whether the overall investment of the league can break through and other issues. One of the most important points is that in order to change the "money embarrassment" of the professional league, the Chinese Football Federation needs to make a substantial breakthrough at the investment level, which needs to be achieved with the help of the party and the state's attention to football.

Financial supervision is another core, from the 2019 season to the 2025 season, access has always been a problem, in fact, we also mentioned that financial supervision is not only access supervision, but also should include a more reasonable and comprehensive financial balance policy (financial fairness policy), stricter access supervision, stricter other financial supervision such as budget review and debt supervision, of course, including multiple incentives and punishments, and the establishment of corresponding functional committees.

Business operations and financial oversight go hand in hand, all in order to safeguard the health of the league and professional clubs, and thus the sustainable development of the league and professional clubs. These two tasks contain multiple levels, each of which is a difficult point, which is the direction that needs to be made after the official establishment of the Chinese Football Federation.