ISL: Bankrupcy no Worry for Team China Project

Though declared bankrupt by a court on Monday, ISMM/ISL, the marketing body of football's world governing body FIFA, has assured the Chinese Football Association (CFA) that the project between them will go on as usual.

Under a six-year contract signed in March 1999 with the CFA, International Sport Leisure (ISL) is in charge of marketing affairs for all China's national teams of different levels in a project titled "Team China".

But the honeymoon turned out to be shortlived as the court of Zug, Switzerland, declared the International Sports Media and Marketing (ISMM) and its offshoot ISL go broken, following French media group Vivendi Universal's decision last week to pull out of a takeover bid for the troubled group.

The court had begun bankruptcy proceedings against ISMM/ISL in April, which caused concern among the Chinese football circles that its ongoing campaign for the 2002 World Cup finals might be financially affected.

But Feng Tao, Team China manager of ISL Asian branch, said on Monday that despite the court ruling, there will be no problem for contracts between CFA and its sponsors.

"When helping CFA find sponsors, we have taken into consideration the possible financial crisis, so all the sponsorship deals were signed by the CFA instead of the ISL, and the money will be directly sent into CFA's bank accounts," Feng was quoted by the Chinese newspaper Sports Weekly as saying.

Feng promised that the ISL will continue to help China in the sponsorship deals until China finishes its last group match in the World Cup qualifiers on May 27 at Jakarta.

The CFA will automatically take over the marketing rights of the Team China project after the contact with the ISL expires.

"Team China project will go on as planned, and we are looking for the new partner in the near future," Zhang Faqiang, vice-president of the CFA, told the newspaper.

There has been rumors that the Canal Plus television station, which is controlled by Vivendi, is likely to fill the shoes of the ISL.

"The company is very interested in the Chinese sport market, and has been undergoing talks with the CFA for about one month," said Soccer, another mass-circulation sport newspaper in China.






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