About

Jiangsu Football Club (Chinese: 江苏足球俱乐部) was a professional football club that participated in the Chinese Super League under licence from the Chinese Football Association (CFA). The team was based in Nanjing, Jiangsu, and their home stadium was the Nanjing Olympic Sports Centre which has a seating capacity of 61,443. Their owners were Suning Appliance Group (Chinese: 苏宁电器集团有限公司), a sister company of Suning.com; the name Suning derives from Sū, a nickname for Jiangsu province, and Níng, a nickname for Nanjing (from its old name Jiāngníng). The team was founded in 1958 as Jiangsu Provincial Team while the current professional football club was established in March 1994. They were one of the founding members of the first fully professional top-tier league in China participating in the 1994 Chinese Jia-A League season; however, they faced relegation in that campaign. They have since gone on to win promotion back into the top tier at the end of the 2008 league season and achieved their best ever league position when they finished champions in the 2020 league season. According to Forbes, Jiangsu are the fourth wealthiest football team in China, with a team value of $144 million, and an estimated revenue of $36 million in 2015.