GULANGYU CUP 2017

Hello XMIFC & Dear Supporters,

IT Happened This June 17th from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.: 250 football players from mostly foreigner teams all over China across 16 men and 4 women teams attended the so-anticipated yearly Gulangyu Cup Tournament on the beautiful natural grass pitch of Gulangyu Island.

Whilst for the past couple of years the sun was almost too-present and burning on this tourney day, this year the rain decided to take over and didn’t seem to want to stop for even a minute.

This was far from discouraging the players though, who competed like warriors until their last game with a rock-hard mentality and went back home with a muddy — irrecuperable if white — outfit. This showed strong sportsmanship and love of the game, thanks everyone for such a strong and great spirit and a special shout out to all our visitors and supporters!

Food Venue & Activities

This year players and supporters alike could enjoy a tasty medium-rare Australian beef burger with some juicy salad, bananas and apples, as well as an ice cream. For the little ones, there was a special DIY plasticine workshop and for the bigger ones, abundant cold Budweiser beer.

ITAO Therapeutic Spa was back for their 2d consecutive year to offer players a great special massage according to their injuries or simply for pleasure. Their massages never fail you!

Rankings
Below are the rankings of the GLY Cup 2017, with XMIFC A in 4th position and XMIFC Legends and XMIFC B as 7th and 9th position respectively. The XMIFC Women Team came in 3d. XMIFC is proud to have all of you as part of the family and is looking forward to future tournaments.

RANKING: Men Teams

1. Quanzhou Spartacus FC
2. Shenzhen Lions FC
3. Gulangyu Yinghua FC
4. XMIFC A
5. Xiamen Bobo FC
6. Tsingtao United FC
7. XMIFC Legends
8. Kunming Turtle
9. XMIFC B
10. Beijing Barbarians FC
11. Hangzhou South Bank FC
12. My Place FC
13. HK Force UTD
14. Dongguan Murrays FC
15. Shanghai FCU
16. Phoenix Knights FC

RANKING: Women Teams

1. Shanghai Mint FC –W
2. Shenghui International FC –W
3. XMIFC –W
4. Qingdao FC –W

Special Thank You & Good-Bye

This year's Gulangyu Cup was very special for XMIFC, as it was the last Gulangyu Cup for some of XMIFC's oldest members, who mostly competed in the legendary XMIFC Legends Team. A special thank you to Danilo Gerstenhauer, Benoist Come and Brett Graham. XMIFC would have never been and won't ever be the same again.

After Party

The after party was held at the Crowne Plaza from 7pm. onwards. Dinner was served under form of a buffet in their special rooftop/bar area and the beer was free-flowing. The last players left around 1 a.m. to go join the other teams who were already at the after-after party location, and it was a really great evening overall! Next year, let's hope for some sun and let's enjoy the swimming pool...!

SEE YOU NEXT YEAR!

Updated 13:55 - 2 Sep 2019 by Charlotte SJM