Zambian Women football golden girl Barbara Banda is on her way to Kunming City in China’s southern Yunnan province ahead of the kick-off of the Chinese Women’s Soccer League.
The City is 1980 Kilometers away from her new base Shanghai. The new Chinese Women’s Soccer League season is expected to start on 23 August. The competition in 2020 will have major changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
#CWSL | The new season is expected to start on 23 August!
The 2020 season will have major changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic. All the matches will be held in Kunming (Yunnan province), at the Haigeng Sports Training Base. pic.twitter.com/DQ6EYIv1jC
— China Women's Football – 中国女足 (@CHNWNT) August 13, 2020
The changes include the fact that all the matches this time around will be held in Kunming (Yunnan province), at the Haigeng Sports Training Base.
The other change is that now the league has ten teams, not eight that competed previously. Shandong Sports Lottery, Zhejiang, and Hebei China Fortune were promoted and will be part of the highest level this year. Dalian who finished in the last place in the 2019 season was dissolved due to financial problems and is the only absent team from the 2019 season.
The competition in 2020 will have two stages. In the first stage, the ten teams will play each other only in one round. The first four placed teams after the nine rounds will play each other, with the two teams with most points, in the end, playing the final.
The remaining six teams will face a playoff against relegation. The number of clubs who will lose their places in the CWSL for 2021 is still to be confirmed as well as the fixtures for the upcoming season.
Barbara Banda joined Shengli in January who will be looking to make her mark on the Chinese Women’s Soccer scene which has now been dominated by Malawian forward Tabitha Chawinga. Nigerian midfielder Francisca Ordega is missing for Shengli while Jiangsu Suning is without Ghanian Elizabeth Addo.
#CWSL | Shanghai Shengli, runner-up in 2019, also are on the road to the Yunnan province today. The club confirmed that Barbra Banda, who arrived in the country in the end of July, is ready for the season. On other hand, Francisca Ordega is not in China. pic.twitter.com/iBn4T3y4QH
— China Women's Football – 中国女足 (@CHNWNT) August 13, 2020
Shengli were runners up in the 2019 Chinese Women’s Super League, eight points behind champions Jiangsu Suning led by league top goalscorer Chawinga who netted 12 goals.
Below are the ten teams that with compete in CWSL in 2020:
- Beijing BG Phoenix
- Changchun Dazhong Zhuoyue
- Guangdong Meizhou Huijun
- Hebei China Fortune
- Henan Jianye
- Jiangsu Suning
- Shandong Sports Lottery
- Shanghai Shengli
- Wuhan Jiangda
- Zhejiang
Good luck mwaiche