Why glamorous big-money signings won’t be enough to fix Chinese football’s corruption problems

With cash flooding in to the Chinese Super League, has the spectre of corruption in the country’s football leagues been laid to rest?

Scores of officials, players, referees have been punished, banned for life or even jailed in recent years as the country tried to clamp down on almost laughable levels of match-fixing and blatant cheating, with even the most die-hard Chinese fan accepting that playing the ‘black ball’ (fixed matches) and other forms of corruption were just a fact of the game.

After the well-publicised clampdown and punishment by the government – and ongoing moves to decouple mainland football from state control – money has poured in, with the CSL outspending every league in the world this winter.

But former top Interpol cop and Fifa anti-fixing expert Chris Eaton of the International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS) warns that there is a danger that the glossy new sheen provided by glamorous big-name signings will be worthless without fundamental reform underneath.

“A highly monied league has one automatic protection – high visibility. But when players’ payments are significantly uneven, and if referees are essentially paid pocket money, major vulnerabilities remain,” he said.