Following the outsized success of Jiangsu’s grassroots “Suchao” soccer league in May, more regions are looking to replicate the eastern province’s winning formula. Northern China’s Hebei province is the latest to do so, launching what is billed as China’s first provincial home-and-away five-a-side soccer league for the general public.

The tournament, dubbed by organizers as “The People’s Soccer League,” kicked off Sunday in the provincial capital, Shijiazhuang, and will run through April 2026. Over the coming months, around 14 teams from across the province will take part in the tournament. Each team can have up to 50 players, with the oldest applicant so far being 50 years old.

Despite no explicit rule saying that women cannot compete in these competitions, only all-male teams have so far taken part.

The Hebei league is designed to be more amateur-friendly than the better-known Jiangsu league, which allows up to three professional players per team. In the knockout playoffs, however, each Hebei team may recruit up to two foreign players to “enhance competitiveness and entertainment value.”

Tourism promotion is unabashedly the league’s primary goal. Instead of hosting all fixtures at one location, as is usually the case with five-a-side competitions, Hebei has adopted a home-and-away format to extend the tournament and provide each city the opportunity to draw crowds.

Plans also include invitational matches between the eventual Hebei champions against top teams from the Jiangsu league and a rural soccer league based in the southwestern Guizhou province.

Match time for the five-a-side games has been extended from the traditional two 20-minute halves to four 15-minute quarters. Organizers hope this will make for faster play, while the additional breaks provide more time for fans to take in cultural performances, fairs highlighting local culture, and various commercial promotions.

Cities are also offering various tourism perks during the events. Match tickets can often be used for half-price or free entry to attractions, or to get discounts at designated “soccer night markets.”

Other provinces — including central Hunan and Hubei, and eastern Jiangxi — are also launching their own soccer events this summer, each with a local twist. For example, the league in Hunan province has 14 city and prefecture teams, with a rule that at least three players aged 16-18 must be on the field, to promote local youth soccer development.

The league in Jiangxi province, which began in July, has drawn more than 294,000 spectators, with short videos of games racking up hundreds of millions of views online. During the games, hotel occupancy, scenic spot visits, and catering revenue in some cities doubled, with hotel bookings in certain areas surging by 220%, according to domestic media.

Jiangsu’s league made a name for itself after attracting huge crowds and significant local spending. Over eight rounds and 48 matches so far, the events have drawn a total of more than 1.1 million spectators — averaging 23,000 per game — fueled by canny social media campaigns and longstanding local rivalries.

In the first six rounds alone, offline tourism, hospitality, and sports-related consumption in the province reached 37.96 billion yuan ($5.24 billion), up 42.7% year on year, according to local media. Data also shows that since the start of the league, ticket bookings for major scenic spots in Nanjing, the provincial capital, have increased by 255% year on year.

Editor: Tom Arnstein.

(Header image: Soccer fans shout and cheer at a Jiangxi City Football Super League match, July 20, 2025. VCG)