Brazilian midfielder Alex Teixeria signed on Friday a €50M four-year contract with Jiangsu Suning. With his transfer Teixera broke China’s transfer records which used to be held and was broken four times by the Chinese Super League.
According to Xinhua News Agency, the 26-year-old player agreed to leave Shakhtar Donetsk of Ukraine. Liu Jun, general manager of Suning, justified the record-breaking contract of Teixera. He said, “Alex is a versatile player who can play many roles. He will boost the team’s competitiveness considerable. We believe that he is worth that sum.”
Teixera’s contract broke the Chinese and Asian records just set on Wednesday when Colombian footballer Jackson Martinez inked a €42-million contract to transfer to Guangzhou Evergrande. Martinez broke the record set on Jan. 21 when another Brazilian player, Elkeson, agreed to move from Shanghai SIPG to Evergrande for €18.5 million.
The new recruit of Suning was a player of Vasco de Gama of Brazil until he moved to Shakhtar in 2010 for €6 million. With Teixera’s score of 26 goals in his latest 26 games for the Ukrainian team, he led them to five league and three Cup titles. He was the Golden Boot awardee for the 2014-2015 season.
According to The Guardian, Teixera scored a total of 89 goals in 223 plays for Donetsk.
Before Teixera’s transfer, in which he joins Ramirez of Brazil, Australian Trent Sainsbury and Croatian Jorge Sammir as foreign recruits, Chelsea attempted to buy Teixera for €32 million, but Donetsk asked for €49 million.