Tianjin Teda

Tianjin Football Club

The club's first incarnation came in 1951 when the local government sports body decided to take part in China's first fully nationalized football league tournament and decided to merge the best players from Beijing and Tianjin to create the North China Football Team. The team name was taken from the football team in the 1910 multi-sport event Chinese National Games that also represented the same regions. The team ended up finishing fourth in their debut season and with the football league gradually expanding, the team was allowed to separate themselves from Beijing and the local government sports body were allowed to reformed the club as Tianjin Football Team in 1956. The players were mainly from the United White team that lost to the United Red team in the finals of the 1956 Chinese National Olympic Football Trial. The club took part in the expanding 1957 Chinese national football league tournament where they ended the campaign as runners-up at the end of the season. By 1959, the club would hire from within and promoted former team captain Zeng Xuelin as their manager, who would return this good faith by winning the 1960 league title as well as the Chinese FA Cup. For the next several seasons, Tianjin would now become regular title contenders. However, the Cultural Revolution halted football within the country and when it returned, Zeng Xuelin had already left to join the Beijing Football Team.

The club brought in Sun Xiafeng to manage the team and he would make sure Tianjin was still a force within the league when he guided the club to the runners-up spot at the end of the 1974 league season, where they narrowly lost the league title to Bayi Football Team on goal difference. His reign at the club was, however, short-lived, and it wasn't until Tianjin brought in Yan Dejun in 1977 that the club would taste any further success. While his first few seasons were not particularly eventful, he would go on to assemble a team built-up of young local players such as Lü Hongxiang, Zuo Shusheng, and Chen Jingang. The players he assembled would go on to mature in the 1980 league season, when Tianjin won the league title at the end of the campaign after a twenty-year wait. With Tianjin allowed to field a B team within the second tier, the club would now have a steady supply of youngsters coming into the team to fight for places, which made sure the 1980 title win wasn't a one-off, when the club won the 1983 North League title. This would, however, be Yan Dejun's last piece of silverware with the club and despite coming close on several occasions, he would leave the team in 1987. It was also during this period that the Chinese Football Association was demanding more professionalism from all the Chinese teams. Unfortunately for the club, this was a transitional period for the team and they were relegated to the second tier at the end of the 1991 league season. Strangely enough, the club's management decided to miss the 1992 league season and spent the whole year in the Netherlands preparing the squad for full professionalism, which the club converted to in 1993.

Professionalism

With the Chinese football leagues fully professional by 1994, Tianjin brought in Lin Xinjiang to manage the club, where he guided them to a runners-up position and promotion back into the top tier at the end of the season. With the club back in the top tier, they soon gained their first sponsorship deal with Samsung in 1995. On the field, they achieved enough to remain within the league until Lin Xinjiang left the club, and they were soon relegated to the second tier once again at the end of the 1997 league season. On February 16, 1998, the TEDA Group (derived from the initials of Tianjin Economic – Technological Development Area) took over the club for 50 million yuan, along with lower league local rivals Tianjin Vanke, to form Tianjin TEDA F.C. for the start of the 1998 Chinese league season. The club would bring in their first-ever foreign coach and immediately win promotion back to the top tier by winning the division title. The club struggled to remain within the top division and often found themselves in the lower half of the league. While this may have been enough to avoid relegation for the previous seasons, the Chinese Football Association decided to employ an averaging system for the 2003 league campaign, which would also take into account the 2002 league results. It seemed like the club would be relegated once again unless they beat title chasers Shanghai COSCO Sanlin on the final league game of the season, which they unexpectedly did, winning the game 2–1. It was discovered that the result was too good to be true and that the general manager Yang Yifeng bribed the Shanghai COSCO Sanlin players Shen Si, Qi Hong, Jiang Jin, and Li Ming to forfeit the game. With the Chinese FA attempting to clean up its image over match-fixing, they decided that despite the incidents taking place over 10 years ago, it would retroactively punish the club on February 18, 2013, with a 1 million Yuan fine and a 6-point deduction at the beginning of the 2013 Chinese Super League season.

Tianjin remained in the Chinese top tier while it re-branded itself as the Chinese Super League. They also affiliated themselves with Australian A-League Club Melbourne Victory in 2007. They achieved little until the club brought in former player Zuo Shusheng to manage the team during the 2008 league season, when he revitalised the team and guided the club to their first-ever entry to the AFC Champions League. At the beginning of the 2009 league season, the club brought in Li Guangyi as their new general manager. However, on August 18, the players went on strike during a training session after it was discovered he wanted to change the club's pay system, which would have shrunken the players' wages, and it was not until the club's owner, Liu Huiwen, heard the players' representatives that the strike ended. After the strike, its leaders, such as Chinese internationals Yang Jun and Han Yanming and Chinese U-23 player Tan Wangsong, would be frozen out of the team and eventually released, while back on the field the club's results declined as they were unable to replicate the previous season's achievements. By the following season, the club would bring in former Chinese international manager Arie Haan, where he guided the club to a runners-up spot at the end of the 2010 league season. He would then guide the club to a last 16 position within the 2011 AFC Champions League and then lead the club to win their first piece of professional silverware when they won the 2011 Chinese FA Cup. In subsequent seasons, they struggled and declined in the ranks, coming within one rank of relegation in the 2018 Chinese Super League. After a short comeback of 7th place in the 2019 season, their situation continued to get worse. Despite the efforts of firing German Uli Stielike and replacing him with Wang Baoshan to attempt for positive changes midway of the season, TEDA was placed last in finishing the regular portion of the 2020 season, with a winless league season of only 3 draws. TEDA also became the first team in CSL history to suffer a winless season (excluding specialized playoffs in 2020 due to the occurrence of COVID-19). Additionally, this season was the worst season in terms of points for both TEDA and any team in CSL history. As an outcome, TEDA sparked the public anger of many of its fans. Plenty of them went on social media such as Weibo to criticize the team and expressed their deep dissatisfaction towards the players, the coach, as well as the club officials. Nevertheless, they won two matches out of six relegation playoffs, which eventually earned them a surprising tenth place as their final position.

Dramatic revival

Since the end of the 2020 season, a series of reports revealed the fact that the team would be discontinued by the TEDA group. The team did not regroup for winter training, while players began to terminate their contracts and move to other teams. Many claimed that their salaries were unpaid. On 28 February 2021, Tianjin Jinmen Tiger failed to submit entrance files for the 2020 season, when it came to a consensus that the team would possibly not participate in the 2021 CSL, although the team constantly remained silent about the issue. Then on 23 March, the day when the CFA was supposed to publish the entry list for the 2021 season, sources claimed that Tianjin Jinmen Tiger would re-submit necessary files for participation, while the publication was actually postponed. A few days later, Tianjin Tigers was officially listed among other 2021 CSL teams, indicating a dramatic revive.