Zhang Enhua (; 28 April 1973 – 29 April 2021) was a Chinese professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

player and coach. As a player, he was a defender from 1994 to 2006 and represented Dalian Wanda FC,

Grimsby Town Grimsby Town Football Club is a professional football club based in Cleethorpes, North East Lincolnshire, England, that in the 2022–23 season will compete in , the fourth tier of the English football league system, following the victory in ...

Tianjin Teda Tianjin Jinmen Tiger Football Club is a professional Chinese football club that currently participates in the Chinese Super League under licence from the Chinese Football Association (CFA). The team is based in Tianjin, and their home stadium is t ...

and

South China South China () is a geographical and cultural region that covers the southernmost part of China. Its precise meaning varies with context. A notable feature of South China in comparison to the rest of China is that most of its citizens are not n ...

while internationally he was a participant at the

2002 FIFA World Cup The 2002 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Korea Japan 2002, was the 17th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial Association football, football world championship for List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams organized by ...

Club career

Dalian Wanda

Zhang Enhua began his professional football career when he joined his local native Chinese football team Dalian Wanda FC at the beginning of the 1994 league season. At the club, he would gradually establish himself in defence and help it win the league title. With Dalian he would establish himself as an integral member of their defence the following season, however they were unable to retain the league title and came third within the league. Nevertheless, the following season would see Zhang Enhua help Dalian stamp their dominance within the league and for the next three seasons they would win consecutive league titles.

Grimsby Town

In 2000, Zhang was made a transfer target of second tier English club

and was then brought to the club on a 3-month loan deal to play in the

Football League Championship The English Football League Championship (often referred to as the Championship for short or the Sky Bet Championship for sponsorship purposes) is the highest division of the English Football League (EFL) and second-highest overall in the En ...

. The defender would be part of a new wave of foreign imports at the club as newly installed manager

Lennie Lawrence Robin Michael Lawrence (born 12 December 1947) is an English former football manager, player and football consultant who is non-executive director at EFL League Two side Hartlepool United. Lawrence was a semi-professional at Croydon, Carshalt ...

brought in

David Nielsen David Jean Nielsen (born 1 December 1976) is a Danish former professional footballer and manager. He played for a number of Danish clubs, as well as Fortuna Düsseldorf in Germany and English clubs Grimsby Town, Wimbledon and Norwich City. His ...

Knut Anders Fostervold Knut Anders Fostervold (born 4 October 1971) is a Norwegian former footballer and cyclist. As a footballer he played as a midfielder and defender from 1991 until 2002, notably played for Molde FK and Grimsby Town. He also played for Sandefjord, ...

and

Menno Willems Menno Willems (born 10 March 1977) is a Dutch former professional footballer who played as a defender between 1996 and 2006. He notably played for Vitesse, Ajax and Grimsby Town. He also played for FC Den Bosch, HFC Haarlem, Sparta Rotterda ...

. Enhua was originally sent in as cover for the injured

Peter Handyside Peter David Handyside (born 31 July 1974) is a Scottish former professional footballer who played as a defender from 1992 until 2007. Despite being Scottish, Handyside played his entire career in England, having initially came through the y ...

, and after a nervous first game, he settled into life at Grimsby, even scoring three times for the club. Lawrence admitted talking to the club over a possible deal being made more permanent but his wages were too big for the club, and Enhua departed the club after his loan spell. He is still regarded as a minor cult hero amongst Grimsby supporters, who took very well to the player while he played in England. His goal celebration in the 1–0 victory over

Burnley Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...

was used by

ITV ITV or iTV may refer to: ITV *Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of: ** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...

Yorkshire Television ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television and commonly referred to as just YTV, is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV (TV network), ITV network. Until 19 ...

in the opening credits for their "

Goals on Sunday ''Goals on Sunday'' is a British football discussion television programme on Sky Sports that shows highlights and analysis of the Premier League, Scottish Premiership and Football League Championship matches. Shown every Sunday and Bank Holid ...

" television programme throughout the 2001–02 season.

Return to China

Zhang returned to China to play for Dalian Wanda (who had renamed themselves

Dalian Shide Dalian Shide was a professional Chinese football club based in Dalian, Liaoning province, China who played in China's football league system between 1955 and 2012. Their home stadiums were the 55,843 capacity Dalian People's Stadium and then lat ...

) once more in time to help win another league title and would also be named in the

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...

squad for the

. Following his departure from Dalian in 2003, Zhang went on to play for Tianjin Teda F.C. for several seasons before joining Hong Kong football team

in 2005 to extend his football career.

International career

Zhang Enhua would make his international debut against

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

in a 0–0 draw on 19 February 1995 in the

Dynasty Cup Dynasty Cup was an East Asian international association football tournament. The tournament was held every 2 or 3 years. It was hosted by Beijing in 1990 and 1992, Hong Kong in 1995, Yokohama and Tokyo in 1998. In 2002 the East Asian Football F ...

. After several further friendlies his performances would be impressive enough to see him included in the

1996 AFC Asian Cup The 1996 AFC Asian Cup was the 11th edition of the men's AFC Asian Cup, a quadrennial international football tournament organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). The finals were held in the United Arab Emirates between 4 and 21 Decembe ...

squad, however, while he would score his debut goal for his country against

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

in the quarter-finals he would, unfortunately, see his team lose 4–3 and get knocked out of the competition. A firm member of the national team he would play a large part in the

1998 FIFA World Cup qualification (AFC) Listed below are the dates and results for the 1998 FIFA World Cup qualification rounds for the Asian zone ( AFC). For an overview of the qualification rounds, see the article 1998 FIFA World Cup qualification. Format A total of 36 teams entered ...

campaign that saw China narrowly miss out on a World Cup spot. He was, however, able to help China qualify for the

2000 AFC Asian Cup The 2000 AFC Asian Cup was the 12th edition of the men's AFC Asian Cup, a quadrennial international association football, football tournament organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). The finals were held in Lebanon between 12 and 29 O ...

and while he started in the early stages he would miss the knock out stages of the competition and only play in the Third place play-off game which China lost 1–0. On 19 May 2002, Zhang was included in China's 23-man squad for the

, but eventually did not make an appearance in the tournament as China was knocked out in the group stage.

International goals

Coaching career

Enhua retired in 2006 and took up coaching in Hong Kong. On 2 March 2011 it was announced that Enhua would be returning to England to complete his coaching badges with the Football Association, and that he would return to former club

as a special guest for the club's home fixture with

AFC Wimbledon AFC Wimbledon is an English professional Association football, football club, based in London Borough of Merton, Merton, London, that plays in the EFL League Two, after being relegated from the EFL League One following the 2021–22 EFL Leagu ...

on 5 March. Upon his return to Grimsby he presented the club with a gift that included

Chinese writing Written Chinese () comprises Chinese characters used to represent the Chinese language. Chinese characters do not constitute an alphabet or a compact syllabary. Rather, the writing system is roughly logosyllabic; that is, a character generally r ...

which translated into 'it might be a long road back, but you can do it and will achieve success eventually'. He also described his visit to the club as a homecoming.

Death

Enhua died on 29 April 2021, one day after his 48th birthday. The cause of his death was reported to be cardiac arrest led by excessive drinking during his birthday party.

Career statistics

International

Honours

Dalian Wanda FC *

Chinese Jia-A League The National Football Jia A League (simplified Chinese, commonly known as Jia-A, was the highest tier of professional football in the People's Republic of China, during 1994 through 2003, operating under the auspices of the Chinese Football Associ ...

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 ...

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The '' Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently ...

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

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 titl ...

Chinese Super Cup The Chinese FA Super Cup (), formerly named Chinese Football Super Cup (), is a pre-season football competition held before the season begins in China. It is a Chinese football championship contested by the winners of top division of Professional ...

: 1997, 2003

References

External links

*
2002 World Cup profile at bbc.co.ukChina Defender Zhang Enhua Denies Retirement Rumors
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zhang, Enhua 1973 births 2021 deaths Chinese footballers Footballers from Dalian Association football defenders China international footballers 2002 FIFA World Cup players 1996 AFC Asian Cup players 2000 AFC Asian Cup players Asian Games medalists in football Footballers at the 1998 Asian Games Asian Games bronze medalists for China Medalists at the 1998 Asian Games Dalian Shide F.C. players Grimsby Town F.C. players Hong Kong First Division League players South China AA players English Football League players Chinese expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in Hong Kong Chinese expatriate sportspeople in Hong Kong