Shanghai Greenland Shenhua
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| Full name | Shanghai Greenland Shenhua Football Club 上海绿地申花足球俱乐部 |
|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | "The Flower of Shanghai" "申花" |
| Founded | November 1951 (Semi-professional) December 1993 (Professional) |
| Ground |
Hongkou Football Stadium, Shanghai, China |
| Capacity | 33,060 |
| Owner | Greenland Group |
| Chairman | Wu Xiaohui |
| Head coach | Gus Poyet |
| League | Chinese Super League |
| 2016 | Super League, 4th |
| Website | Club home page |
Shanghai Greenland Shenhua Football Club (simplified Chinese: 上海绿地申花足球俱乐部; traditional Chinese: 上海綠地申花足球俱樂部; pinyin: Shànghǎi Lǜdì Shēnhuā Zúqiú Jùlèbù), is a professional Chinese football club that currently participates in the Chinese Super League under licence from the Chinese Football Association (CFA). The term shen hua literally translates as "the Flower of Shanghai" in English – shen is one of the alternative names of Shanghai and hua means flower in Chinese. The team is based in Kangqiao, Shanghai and their home stadium is the Hongkou Football Stadium, which has a seating capacity of 33,060. Their current majority shareholder is Chinese developer Greenland Group who officially took over the operation of the club when they bought the 28.5% share from previous majority shareholder Zhu Jun on 31 January 2014.
The club's predecessor was called Shanghai F.C. and they predominantly played in the top tier, where they won several domestic league and cup titles. On 10 December 1993 the club was reorganised to become a completely professional football club so they could play in the 1994 Chinese Jia-A League season making them one of the founding members of the first fully professional top tier league in China. Since then, they have won the 1995 league title and 1998 Chinese FA Cup.
According to Forbes, Shenhua are the 6th most valuable football team in China, with a team value of $106 million, and an estimated revenue of $29 million in 2015.
Shanghai Shenhua's predecessor was originally called East China, a team name used as far back as 1910 for the football in the multi-sport event Chinese National Games. The local Shanghai government sports body decided to use this name for their new club founded on 1 November 1951 to take part in China's first fully nationalized national football league tournament where they finished second in the league that year. The football league gradually expanded and the team were allowed to name themselves after their own province of Shanghai in 1957. Soon afterwards by 1961, Shanghai started to establish themselves as a major football team within China when they won their first league title. This was then quickly followed by their second league title in 1962, however in 1966 because of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, football in China was halted and Shanghai were unable to play. When football returned in China, Shanghai were able to return to the top tier, however they were unable to regain any of the dominance that they had previously shown and were even relegated in 1980. Though they were able to be quickly promoted in the following season, they spent many years without actually winning any titles until Wang Houjun lead them to win the Chinese FA Cup in 1991, which was their first trophy in 29 years.
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