2006 Chinese Super League

The 2006 Chinese Super League was the third season since the establishment of the Chinese Football Association Super League (中国足球协会超级联赛 or 中超), also known as Chinese Super League, the thirteen season of professional association football league and the 45th top-tier league season in China. The premier football league in China under the auspices of the Chinese Football Association, the season started on March 11, 2006 and ended on October 22. Initially, it was planned that there would be two teams relegated at the end of the season, however this was changed to one when Sichuan First City folded before the start of the season.

Teams promoted from 2005 China League One

• Xiamen Lanshi
• Changchun Yatai

Teams relegated after end of 2005 Chinese Super League

• None

A number of changes occurred during the off season, notably some major changes to the teams. Inter Shanghai moved to Xi'an and was renamed Xi'an Chanba. Shanghai Zobon was renamed Shanghai United.

Beijing Hyundai, who did not renew their contract with Hyundai, changed their team name back to their formal name, Beijing Guoan.

Shenzhen Jianlibao changed its team name to Shenzhen Kingway after finding a new sponsor in Kingway Brewery.

There was also some speculation that Liaoning would pull out from the league, and that the Chinese Football Association had prepared a schedule with only 14 teams should Liaoning have withdrawn.

The biggest shock was the disbanding of Sichuan First City in January, so the league will only have 15 teams at the start of the season, one short of the 16 teams planned.

Shanghai Shenhua, who qualified for the AFC Champions League, boost their squad with Li Weifeng from the debt-ridden Shenzhen Jianlibao for 6.5 million RMB, the highest transfer fee this season. In additional, Shenhua bought over Liu Yunfei from Tianjin TEDA for 0.9 million and recalled defender Du Wei from Celtic.

Desperately in need of money, Shenzhen was also forced to sell China's first choice goalkeeper, Li Leilei to Shandong Luneng for 5 million, former national striker Yang Chen to the newly promoted Xiamen Lanshi for 2 million and Zhou Ting to Beijing Guoan for 3.5 million.

Other notable transfers included Wang Liang's 5 million move from Liaoning to Shandong, An Qi's 4 million move from defending champions Dalian Shide to Xiamen, and four players from Shandong (An Shuai, Zhou Yi, Sun Bing, and Cha Kejun) to Qingdao Jonoon for 1 million each.

The number of foreign players is restricted to three, but all teams can only use two foreign players on the field in each game. Players from Hong Kong, Macau and Chinese Taipei are deemed to be native players in CSL.

• Players name in bold indicates the player is registered during the mid-season transfer window.
• Players in italics were out of the squad or left the club within the season, after the pre-season transfer window, or in the mid-season transfer window, and at least had one appearance.

Shandong Luneng and newcomer Changchun Yatai both had a good spell early on while defending champions Dalian Shide struggled early on. During the mid season, Changchun finally cannot kept up with the pace of the top league and gradually drops to fourth in the league. Meanwhile, a record 13 league win in a row saw Shandong gaining an unassailable lead at the top. With Shandong the clear winner, the interest in the second half of the season was the race to the second place and the fight against relegation.

In the end, Chongqing Lifan were relegated with two games to go while the race for second went all the way down to the wire before Shanghai Shenhua clinch the second spot with a last day win over Liaoning while Beijing Guoan slips.

• Total attendance: 2,228,300
• Average attendance: 10,611

• Chinese Super League
• Football in China
• Chinese Football Association
• Chinese Football Association Jia League
• Chinese Football Association Yi League
• Chinese FA Cup

• Results and table on RSSSF
• 2006 Chinese Super League Archived 2007-12-22 at the Wayback Machine on Csl.sports.cn (in Chinese)
• 2006 Chinese Super League on sports.cn.yahoo.com (in Chinese)