CHINA’S COSTLY TEVEZ MISTAKE
CARlos tEvEz has scored twice in 15 matches for shanghai shenhua this season. the club are 32 points off the top and manager Gus Poyet has resigned. tevez’s new coach, Wu Jingui, says tevez, 33, is unfit and overweight and will not play until this improves. tevez is paid £650,000 a week to play in an inferior league so, like so many of China’s newest recruits, we know why he signed. Contrast this with current league leaders Guangzhou Evergrande. they have three Brazilians on their staff, with a single cap between them. Ricardo Goulart won the title and a Player of the year award with Cruzeiro in 2013, and came on as a substitute for his country against Ecuador. When he left for China in 2015, he was the super league’s most expensive signing — at around £12million. he has been joined by Alan, who had a few good years at Austria’s Red Bull salzburg before leaving for £10m, while Muriqui is the definition of the journeyman player. now in his second spell at Guangzhou, they are his 13th club, including loan spells. All of these players will be a significant upgrade on the local talent but they are not superstars motivated only by a final payday. Alan and Goulart are at peak ages, Muriqui a little older. All will be driven to succeed, rather than merely dig for a last pot of gold. At shanghai, and across much of China, this will have been a harsh and expensive lesson to learn.