Soccer ball

BEIJING. The Tieling court on Saturday (18 February 2012) morning jailed a former Chinese soccer chief and an ex-head of referees for bribery and fixing games.

Yang was the supervisor of the Chinese professional soccer as the director of the Chinese Football Association (CFA) league. He had taken bribes from some 20 clubs and individuals on over 40 occasions. This included a bribe of $10,000 from Jiangsu Shuntian club for fixing the fitness test results for players. He was also fined $31,700. He told that he would not appeal against the sentence.

Zhang Jianqiang  received a 12-year prison term for taking bribes of $433,000 on 24 occasions.  He admitted to taking bribes from Chinese Super League clubs including Shandong Luneng and Shanghai Shenhua. He had accepted money from Shenhua to help the club win the 2003 league.

Former CFA heads Nan Yong and his successor Xie Yalong, are awaiting trial.