Back in the bubble, Chinese Super League into playoff stages

When Odil Ahmedov left Shanghai SIPG to join fellow Chinese Super League club Tianjin Teda in August, the midfielder didn’t have to travel anywhere to meet his new coach and colleagues.

He merely moved to a different part of the hotel both teams had called home since July, and took a seat at a new breakfast table.

In a bid to complete the 2020 season in the midst of restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chinese Football Association decided to split the 16 top-tier CSL teams into two groups based in the hub cities of Dalian and Suzhou.

So not only were the eight teams in each group based in those cities from July - five months late because of the coronavirus outbreak - but players, coaches, referees and federation officials were sharing the same hotel complexes, unable to leave, except to take the bus to the stadium on match days.

“Football is a sport with many surprises and in this special time and special environment, I don’t need to fly anywhere,” Ahmedov told news site Sohu.com of the unusual circumstances of his move. “I just changed buildings and completed a transfer ... No problem.”

The first phase of the competition was staged between July 22 and Sept. 28 before a brief recess ahead of the second phase, which started last Friday.

The top eight teams have gone into a playoff round based in Suzhou to continue pursuit of the title, and the bottom eight teams have gone into a relegation round based in Dalian.

Apart from some time earlier this month, most players and staff involved have been unable to see family members as the federation aims to keep the league as safe as possible. So far it has worked, with no positive cases reported from the regular testing for coronavirus inside the bio-security hubs. But it has presented head coaches such as Afshin Ghotbi of Shijiazhuang Ever Bright with new challenges.

Associated Press