Jia Xiuquan

Jia Xiuquan (simplified Chinese: 贾秀全; traditional Chinese: 賈秀全; pinyin: Jiǎ Xiùquán; born November 9, 1963 in Dalian, Liaoning) is a Chinese former international footballer and head coach.

Player career

Club career

As a player, Jia Xiuquan predominately played the majority of his career for Bayi Football Team. During his time at Bayi, he saw them win two league titles, his first title in 1981 and his second in the 1986 league season,.^[1][2] He would also personally win the Chinese Football Association Golden Ball award in 1983, 1984 and 1986.^[3] After achieveing these honours he was one of the first Chinese players to attract interest from foreign teams. Jia would eventually transfer to Yugoslav First League team FK Partizan where he moved in 1988 together with Liu Haiguang. They stayed in Belgrade for two seasons winning the 1988–89 Yugoslav Cup. Afterwords Jia will move to Malaysian club Royal Polis and then Japanese outfit Gamba Osaka before he retired.

International career

In 1982, he would make his debut for the Chinese national team, however he would rise to prominence in the 1984 AFC Asian Cup where China finished runners up and Jia was personally named as the Asian Cup Most Valuable Player.^[4] A constant regular within the team Jia would captain the team from 1987 until 1992 where he led China in an unsuccessful FIFA World Cup qualifying campaign as well as the 1988 and 1992 AFC Asian Cup, eventually achieving 55 caps^[5] for his country.^[6] He was also part of the Chinese team at the 1988 Summer Olympics.

Coaching career

After he retired, Bayi Football Team offered Jia a chance to rejoin them and coach them for a short period, however his presence within the team was unable to lift them from a spending much of the season near the bottom of the league.^[7] With Shaanxi Guoli, Jia managed a newly formed team starting at the bottom of the Chinese league system and would lead them to promotion to the second tier in the 1997 league season.^[8] This caught the attention of the Chinese Football Association and offered him the China national under-17 football team, however his reign with them was uninspired and the team were unable to qualify for any major tournaments.

In 2000 Shanghai Shenhua were willing to give Jia a chance to join them as a trainer before Bayi asked Jia to join them again. Once again he spent much of his time trying to keep Bayi in the top tier of the league system. However despite achieving this he left them at the end of the 2002 league season where they finished a disappointing 13th.^[9] Jia would later accept a position for the China national under-23 football team however this was short lived and he resigned in February 2004. Once again he took another training position with Shanghai but because English Head Coach Howard Wilkinson resigned before the start of the beginning of the league season Jia acted as the head coach through the majority of the season, Shanghai ultimately ended the season finishing 10th.^[10] In 2005 Jia returned to the Chinese under-23 team as a permanent manager to compete for the Football at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Men's tournament, however at the beginning of the 2008 league season Henan Jianye offered Jia the chance to manage them in the top tier, Jia took this position but had a poor start to the season and was replaced with Acácio Casimiro. In September 2008 Jia was again offered the chance to manage Shanghai Shenhua, this time on a permanent basis and took Shanghai to second in the league.^[11] At the end of the 2009 Jia was dismissed by the club again after a disappointing season with the team ranking 5th. Later he was reported to be arrested for receiving bribes during his stint at Chinese youth team. ^[12]

Controversies

Though having experiences in managing a few top flight teams and national youth team, Jia's ability in coaching has been widely criticized by his former players and staff. It is believed that he was able to get the positions in Shanghai Shenhua simply because of his solid background in China FA and his willingness to allow chairman Zhu Jun's interference on team management. Arguably he is the most disliked managers ever in Shanghai Shenhua history. After his scandal in match fixing was revealed, he has never appeared in public ever since.

Club statistics

National team statistics

^[13]

Honours

As a player

• Chinese Jia-A League: 1981, 1986
• 1984 AFC Asian Cup, MVP
• Chinese Football Association Jia League A Group, Golden Ball, 1983, 1984, 1986

As a manager

• China League Two: 1997 Third place

References

External links

• Profile at Fifa
• Player stats at national-football-teams.com
• 1988 Olympic profile