Cao Xiandong (Chinese:曹限东 born 19 August 1968) is a Chinese football coach and a former international

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

. In his career, he represented

Beijing Guoan Beijing Guoan Football Club () is a professional football club that currently participates in the Chinese Super League under licence from the Chinese Football Association (CFA). The team is based in the Chaoyang District in Beijing and their hom ...

where he won two

Chinese FA Cup The Chinese FA Cup (, abbreviated as CFA Cup) is the national knockout cup competition in China organized by the Chinese Football Association. Its current holders are Shandong Taishan, having beaten Shanghai Port in 2021 for a record seventh tit ...

s along with

Qingdao Etsong Hainiu Qingdao Hainiu may reference one of the following football clubs: * Qingdao F.C., a football club established in 2013, named Qingdao Hainiu between 2013 and 2015 * Qingdao Hainiu F.C. (1990), a football club established in 1990, formerly named Q ...

and Beijing Kuanli. Internationally he played for the Chinese team that took part in the 1996 Asian Cup. Since retiring he moved into assistant management and then gained his first head coaching position with

Beijing BIT Beijing Institute of Technology Football Club (Simplified Chinese: 北京理工大学足球俱乐部) or simply BIT is a professional Chinese football club that currently participates in the China League One division under licence from the Chine ...

Playing career

Cao Xiandong was considered a talented

and was soon called up to the Chinese under-17 team that took part in the

1985 FIFA U-16 World Championship The 1985 FIFA U-16 World Championship, the first edition of the tournament, was held in the cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, and Dalian in People's Republic of China from July 31, 1985, to August 11, 1985. Players born after August 1, 1968, ...

where China were knocked out in the quarter-finals to

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

in a 4-2 defeat. He eventually went on to graduate to the senior team of

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

and once he started to become a regular he was given his debut for his country in a friendly against

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...

on August 31, 1992 in a 0-0 draw. He soon established himself as a regular for the national team and went to the

Football at the 1994 Asian Games Football (soccer), Football at the 1994 Asian Games was held in Hiroshima, Japan from 1 to 16 October 1994. The Asian Football Confederation suggested that only under-23 teams should be entered, which meant that all the players had to be born a ...

where China came runners-up to

Uzbekistan Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked co ...

in a 4-2 defeat in the final. Cao Xiandong soon gained his first piece of silverware when Beijing won the 1996 and then 1997

.China List of Cup Winners
at rsssf.com 22 Oct 2009 Retrieved 2012-08-08 After this success Cao Xiandong decided to join

for a brief period before joining second-tier club Beijing Kuanli in 1999 where he soon ended his playing career with them.

Career statistics

International goals

:''Scores and results list China's goal tally first.''

Honours

Player

Club

Beijing Guoan *

: 1996, 1997

International

China *

Asian Games The Asian Games, also known as Asiad, is a continental multi-sport event held every four years among athletes from all over Asia. The Games were regulated by the Asian Games Federation (AGF) from the first Games in New Delhi, India, until t ...

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...

(Silver)

References

External links

* *
Player profile
at sodasoccer.com
Team China Stats
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cao, Xiandong 1968 births Living people Chinese football managers Chinese footballers Footballers from Beijing China international footballers Beijing Guoan F.C. players Qingdao Hainiu F.C. (1990) players Asian Games silver medalists for China Asian Games medalists in football Association football midfielders Footballers at the 1994 Asian Games Medalists at the 1994 Asian Games