Super League

China's calendar-year top flight, where Guangzhou's era of dominance has given way to a Shanghai-led title race.

The Chinese Super League is the top flight of men's football in China, run by the Chinese Football Association since 2004 as the rebrand of the earlier Jia-A League, which had been the country's top division from 1994. Unlike most Asian leagues that mirror the European calendar, the CSL plays a calendar-year season, kicking off in February or March and finishing around November or December, with sixteen clubs contesting a single round-robin table. The bottom club is relegated to China League One, while the top finishers qualify for the AFC Champions League Elite and AFC Champions League Two. Guangzhou, formerly Guangzhou Evergrande, is the league's most successful club with eight titles, including a run of seven straight championships built on heavy foreign investment during the league's spending boom in the 2010s. That era has since given way to tighter financial regulation and the rise of Shanghai's two clubs, Shanghai Port and Shanghai Shenhua, alongside Beijing Guoan and Shandong Taishan as the league's current powers. Attendances remain among the highest in Asian football, with several clubs regularly drawing crowds above 40,000. For a fan following it on a scores site, the CSL offers a distinctive mid-year title race, a large contingent of Brazilian and other South American imports, and a competitive top group chasing continental qualification.