China's is expected to launch the national chess league next year, the head coach of the Chinese national chess team said at the end of the national team championships here on Wednesday.

Inside China's State General Administration of Sports, there isan administrative center supervising the games of Chinese chess (Xiangqi in Chinese), (international) chess and go chess. But the games have their independent national associations.

Ye Jiangchuan, the national chess head coach, said that chess has been in a rapid progress in China in recent years and a great number of young and promising players have sprung up from grassroots. All this had laid down a solid foundation for the launch of a national league, Ye said.

After detailed discussions with officials and coaches from across the country, Ye believed that conditions are ripe for initiating league competitions.

According to a rough plan, 18 teams will compete in a four-leg qualification stage set for early next year and the top eight teams out of the stage will be named class A teams. Six out of the class A teams will enter the league competitions on a home-and-away basis.

It is estimated that by 2007, there'll be 12 teams in the regular national league, which will take the relegation format, Yeadded.

Source: Xinhua