Just yesterday, Henan Football Club officially announced the official departure of Li Weifeng, deputy general manager of the club. This means that the former captain of the national football team, who has been in office for less than half a year, was fired by the Chinese Super League club in the Central Plains.
It is understood that Li Weifeng officially accepted the invitation of Henan Football Club on December 20 last year as the deputy general manager of the club, in charge of the first team and youth training. At the beginning of his tenure, the 45-year-old former captain of the national football team was also full of ambition, hoping to inject fresh vitality into this old Chinese Super League team in the Central Plains with his professional management and extensive contacts in the football circle.
Li Weifeng, who was a player, was once a man of the year in Chinese football, and he was also the anchor of the national football team's defense. He has served as the captain of the national football team for a long time, and his career has left his footprints in Shenzhen, Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangzhou, England and South Korea. And as the main force, he helped the national football team reach the 2002 South Korea-Japan World Cup.
As a player, Li Weifeng has made great achievements and has a pivotal position in Chinese football. This also allows him to continue to thrive in Chinese football after retiring. Having worked as vice president and head coach of Tianjin Tianhai and Guangzhou City, he has demonstrated a strong professional standard in both club management and first-team coaching.
So the main reason for the dismissal from the Henan club this time is that the team's results are too poor. At the beginning, he hired South Korean coach Nam Ki-il under his leadership, but after 12 rounds of this competition, the Henan team only ranked 12th in the Super League standings with 2 wins, 4 draws, 6 losses and 10 points, and the relegation situation is not optimistic. Especially after he served as the deputy general manager of Henan Club, he made great adjustments to the first team. Some of the main players, including the team's main goalkeeper Wang Guoming, were purged and replaced by new signings with extremely poor performance such as Xu Jiamin and Xu Haofeng.
Although Li Weifeng took over the Henan club, the original intention of the series of reform measures he implemented was to help the Central Plains club regain its life and become a team with the strength to compete for the championship in the Chinese Super League. But contrary to expectations, his overly conceited personality also exposed some flaws in his personality, leading to falling into the whirlpool of public opinion when the team was not doing well.
However, for Li Weifeng, who is in the prime of life, his future career still has a long way to go. Although he did not achieve his ambitious goals at Henan FC, he could still get a new job opportunity in the future. Regarding his future whereabouts, some bloggers revealed that Li Weifeng may go to Shenhua and serve as the club's technical director. We will pay close attention to the future of the former national football captain.