Alex Teixeira & Jean Evrard Kouassi plan to represent China

According to recent media reports,

and

could be joining China International team after failing to earn a spot with their nations since they have already spent five years in China.

Teixeira’s naturalization is expected to cost around €80 million (US$98 million) and though this move wouldn’t have been possible if he had responded to his transfer talks with a Saudi Arabian team, the 31-year-old could be joining China after all.

On the other hand, the Coast Ivorian Kouassi also shared a story on

Instagram

, which showed him in China national team jersey, having already revealed that he received an invitation to join China last year.

Soccer News

newspaper and

Jinyun News

reported that Teixeira will be joining China after agreeing to sign a third-party contract with

.

Though Jiangsu’s current financial difficulties could lead Sunning into selling the club, Teixeira could still sign a contract with the Chinese Super League side, since he is already a registered player in the league,

Soccer News

reported.

Mixed reviews were received from Chinese fans regarding the matter with some saying:

“Naturalized players are the best way for countries all over the world to improve their national football level.”

Another user in

Dalian

wrote:

“If China spends 2 billion euros to naturalize 22 players, even if there is a good performance in the World Cup, it has nothing to do with Chinese football. It can only show that China has money. It‘s not good to have money, it’s worthless to accumulate some ‘scores’ with real money!”

Among other foreign players, who have been representing China or are expected to join the international team in their upcoming games, are

,

, Alan Carvalho,

,

, and

.

In response to the concerns over Foreigners taking over the national team instead of Chinese footballers, Chinese Football Association secretary general, Liu Yi said, said:

“We will not let two-thirds of the national team’s line-up be Brazilian naturalised players. We will recruit two or three, or maybe three or four Brazilian naturalised players. That’s it.”

Before Liu Yi, the CFA chairman, Chen Xuyuan, also talked about the matter, saying:

“From the bottom of my heart, I hope it is just a small episode of a stage, let it pass. This [naturalisation] will not become the norm, it will not become the theme, it will not be like some of our fans said that the 11 players in our country are all naturalised, which is absolutely impossible.”

Still Li Tie hopes that the naturalized players will help them to end their 20-year wait for the Fifa World Cup as they prepare for the Fifa World Cup Qatar 2022 qualifiers in June.

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