History
The club was founded in June 1954 as Guangzhou Football Team. It became the first professional football club in China after Apollo Group took over the club in January, 1993. Guangzhou have won five second tier league titles in 1956, 1958, 1981, 2007 and 2010. The best achievement in the first tier league is second place which Guangzhou finished in 1992 and 1994. Guangzhou also reached the final of Chinese FA Cup in 1991 but lost 1–0 to Shanghai.
In February 2010, Guangzhou was relegated to China League One in the fallout of a match fixing scandal despite having achieved the ninth place in the previous season of Chinese Super League. The match in question dated back to 2006, when the club was still playing in the China League One. Guangzhou paid CNY 200,000 to its opponent to secure a win at home. On 28 February 2010, Evergrande Real Estate Group took over the club with a fee of ¥100 million. Xu Jiayin, chairman of Evergrande Real Estate Group, said that they would pump more funds into the transfer market. His first act was to sign in China national team striker Gao Lin from Shanghai Shenhua for a reported fee of ¥6 million, then he replaced the previously existing head coach Peng Weiguo with former Beijing Guoan coach Lee Jang-Soo with no indication. In the 2010 summer transfer window, the club signed Sun Xiang, the first Chinese footballer to play in the UEFA Champions League with PSV Eindhoven, and Zheng Zhi, former China national team captain on 28 June. More pleasant amazement came in two days later, on 30 June, Guangzhou confirmed that they had signed Muriqui on a four-year deal from Campeonato Brasileiro Série A side Atlético Mineiro with a domestic record fee of CNY 22,980,000. On 30 October 2010, Guangzhou successfully achieved League One champion for the second time and returned to Super League after a 3–1 victory to Hunan Billows.
During the 2011 season, Guangzhou Evergrande further strengthened its' squad with the purchase of Argentinean Dario Conca and Brazilian Cléo. Although the team was promoted to the Super League in the first year, they clinched the league title in late September 2011 although there were 4 games yet to play. In March 2012, Guangzhou played and won their first ever AFC Champions League match, thrashing Korean champions Jeonbuk Motors 5-1. Lucas Barrios left the German football champion Borussia Dortmund in the summer of 2012 to join Guangzhou Evergrande F.C. Marcello Lippi replaced Lee Jang-Soo as the head coach and brought in Korean defender Kim Young-Gwon and Chinese midfielder Huang Bowen. Guangzhou was knocked out of the 2012 AFC Champions League when they lost 5-4 on aggregate to Al Ittihad in the quarterfinals. They were the first Chinese side to reach the quarterfinals since 2006. During the 2012 season, Guangzhou Evergrande won the league for the second time in a row, becoming the first team in China to win the Super League title twice in a row, while also securing the Chinese FA Cup to become double winners for 2012.
Read more about this topic: Guangzhou Evergrande F.C.
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