History
Found as Shenzhen Jinpeng (or Shenzhen Kinspar, simplefied Chinese: 深圳金鹏) by the Shenzhen Kinspar Group in 1996, the club won the membership of the second division (Chinese Football Association Jia League Group B) by defeating Xiamen in the final of the third and the lowest division Chinese Football Association Yi League. In the following year, Shenzhen Jinpeng lost the bid to the championship and sold the club to Yunnan Hongta Group, a tobacco producer. The team was renamed Yunnan Hongta. They played in Tuodong Stadium.
Yunnan Hongta made huge investment in the club. First, Qi Wusheng, who failed to lead China to qualify for the 1998 FIFA World Cup was introduced in 1999. Next, the club bought a lot of young players from the upper division (Group A). Under Qi Wusheng the team won the runner up position of Group B and was promoted to Group A.
In the next year, Ou Chuliang, the goalkeeper of the national team, was transferred from Shanghai Shenhua. Qi Wusheng's coaching in the national team made the team attractive to many national footballers. In 2002, another national team regular player Wei Qun followed Ou Chuliang and joined the team.
After settled down in Group A, Yunnan Hongta began to chase the championship in 2002. However, despite of leading in the first half, they end up with the seventh. In the same year, they hosted Real Madrid during their offseason.
Read more about this topic: Yunnan Hongta F.C.
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of the genesis or the old mythology repeats itself in the experience of every child. He too is a demon or god thrown into a particular chaos, where he strives ever to lead things from disorder into order.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I believe that history might be, and ought to be, taught in a new fashion so as to make the meaning of it as a process of evolution intelligible to the young.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)