Manchester City were outclassed by Stoke City at the weekend, losing 2-0 at the Brittania Stadium. The only vaguely positive aspect to take from the defeat was that it could have been worse. Off the pitch, there was some big news that certainly looks as if it could be good for the club. A few days before the lesson in the Potteries, a Chinese consortium of investors paid $265 million for a 13% stake in the club’s parent company, the City Football Group (CFG).
– GALLERY: Cristiano Ronaldo’s best quotes
– ValoraFutbol: This week’s La Liga top-5 players
– SHARE, RATE, WIN: With Sport360 ValoraFutbol
– Follow: Live football scores around the world
There are two hurdles that European clubs must overcome if they want to ‘crack’ the Chinese market. First they have to be popular. That is not easy. Harder still is turning that into revenue. City have barely started with the first. In terms of English Premier League clubs, Manchester United are leading the way with Arsenal and Chelsea not too far behind. It takes time to build an identity.
On the field success is a prerequisite though not enough in itself. City have won two English Premier League titles in the time since Sheikh Mansour took over in 2008 and started pouring serious money into the Eastlands outfit. A lack of European success has not helped. The Sky Blues have yet to make an impact in the UEFA Champions League. Getting to the quarter-finals on a regular basis is the minimum, something that the club has not yet come close to doing. Ultimately though, City have to look like winning it. You could argue that Arsenal – a club that has been very active in China in terms of marketing, promotion and engagement– have not done that for a while but the Gunners have a long history of reaching the knockout stage, have established a brand of football under a famous and popular coach, over the past 10-15 years, have had -and still have- some big names to boast of.
City do too but after all the money spent, there are few globally recognisable faces. Of the players who took the pitch against Stoke, there are not many who would receive a second glance walking down Nanjing Road in Shanghai or Wangfujing Street in Beijing especially as Vincent Kompany and Sergio Aguero were out. It was no coincidence that Chinese president Xi Jinping took a selfie with the Argentine striker. Here was one City player who would need no introduction to the casual fan out in the Middle Kingdom.
It is going to take City years of on the pitch success to rival the more traditional big boys in Europe in terms of popularity in China
For City to become real force in China, there is a need to keep winning in England, do better in Europe and then sign a few more world names in the short-term. There is something else. City are looking to get involved in China by using the Chinese themselves and here the club has an advantage. First there was making Sun Jihai, a City player from 2002 to 2008, an official ambassador in November. The move was mocked in the UK media as Sun, while solid and willing enough, was hardly one of the best players ever to pull on the shirt. It was welcomed in China however. And then there was the visit of President Xi. The Chinese leader turning up at Eastlands? It was a sign that something big was happening.
And then came the recent deal to buy a stake in CFG which is often reported as synonymous with the English club. The deal in itself will raise the profile of and interest in City. But there could be more. The English are just one, albeit the biggest, part of CFG which also owns clubs in New York and Melbourne and also has a 20% stake in Yokohama F. Marinos, a Japanese powerhouse.
C´mon City! Good to hear about the China news. Remember this? I look forward to visiting soon. pic.twitter.com/SKvzIbhxqj
— Sergio Kun Aguero (@aguerosergiokun) December 2, 2015
Citic, a large Chinese investment company, is part of the consortium and is also the main financial backer of Beijing Guoan, one of the country’s leading clubs. This has led to rumours and speculation that there could be a takeover and that a Chinese Super League team, like Beijing, could be added to the stable. The noises from the group are that there are no such plans to do so at the moment but this could be a case of keeping cards close to chests.
It would be a logical step in order to get a real foothold in the Chinese market and actually establish something that has been missing for a while -a genuine link between the world’s most popular league and its most populous country. If CFG gets involved, opens academies, unearths a star or two, is seen to assist the development of Chinese football and is seen to be giving and not taking (unlike many European rivals) then there are possibilities.
Exactly what those would be is hard to say as it has never been done before. If it was easy to make huge amounts of money in China then others would already have done so. It is going to take City years of on the pitch success to rival the more traditional big boys in Europe in terms of popularity in China but last week’s deal may just provide a shortcut to success in the Middle Kingdom’s massive market.
