Looking at the careers of the two new head coaches, it's easy to see that they were both sharpened at Evergrande's football school and have left their footprints in Wuhan's youth training system. Their styles are very different, one of them advocates the finesse of Japanese soccer, the other favors the three-dimensionality of European soccer, but the core of their tactics is to control the ball. With Koji Maeda taking over the reins at Guangzhou, it is expected that there will be no disruptive changes to the existing tactical system. However, the challenges facing Guangzhou should not be underestimated. Under the financial constraints, the selection of the first-team manager is limited to the limited number of foreign coaches at the Evergrande Football School, and although the change of manager has not caused too much loss, the future is still uncertain.
Koji Maeda's coaching performance in the 2024 season did not seem to win the trust of the fans. He led the Haikou Mingcheng team, which is mainly composed of players from Evergrande Football School, to play in the Second Division, and although they struggled to be relegated at the end of the season, their overall performance was not convincing. Many people still have doubts about the performance of the Guangzhou team in the 2025 season.
With a new manager in place, the team is facing a complete overhaul. Whether Koji Maeda can take Guangzhou to new heights, his clinical dispatching and other coaching abilities will be directly related to the team's performance. Guangzhou is eager for promotion, but the journey to the 2025 season is full of thorns. El Salvador's Chongqing Tongliang Dragons and Tigers know Guangzhou like the back of their hands, while the well-funded Guangzhou Panthers and Li Jin Yu's Liaoning Ironmen have the potential to become strong rivals on the road to promotion.
In the new season of the Chinese Super League, the old and new coaches will undoubtedly be one of the major attractions of the match, with their Japanese and Western-style tactics. Both coaches attach importance to the training of young players, and pass-control soccer as the core of the tactics, this duel will bring more excitement to the Chinese Super League.
