Full name | Baoding Yingli Yitong Football Club |
---|---|
Founded | 2008 17 April 2015 (Professional) |
(Amateur)
Ground | Hebei University Stadium, Baoding |
Capacity | 20,000 |
Manager | Zhao Changhong |
League | China League One |
2016 | League Two, 2nd (promoted) |
Baoding Yingli Yitong (Chinese: 保定英利易通) is a professional Chinese football club that currently participates in the China League One division under licence from the Chinese Football Association (CFA). The team is based in Baoding, Hebei and their home stadium is the 13,000 capacity Baoding People's Stadium. Their current owner is the Baoding City Real Estate Group Co., Ltd.
The club was originally formed as Hebei Yingli (河北英利) in 2008 as an affiliated team by the China Yingli group, where they took part as an amateur team in the Hebei Amateur Football League. With a team built using Yingli employees they were able to reach the China Amateur Football League finals where they came fourth in the 2010 championship. After this performance the Baoding City Real Estate Group Co., Ltd became interested in acquiring the club so they could register them in and gain participation in the China League Two division. This would come into fruition on April 21, 2015 when they officially took over the club, renamed them Baoding Yingli Yitong F.C. and converted them into a professional team when they participated at the bottom of the professional Chinese football league within the 2015 China League Two season. In their debut season Fan Yuhong was brought in as the Head coach and the club would play within the Baoding Foreign Language School Stadium. After finishing fifth within their group stage and missing out on the play-offs Zhao Changhong was brought in as the new manager the following season, where with continued investment from Baoding City Real Estate Group along with a move to Baoding People's Stadium, he was able to guide the club to a runners-up spot at the end of the 2016 China League Two season and promotion to the China League One division for the first time.