text: With the club in a higher division, Shanghai East Asia moved into the 30,000 seater Jinshan Sports Centre in Jinshan District of Shanghai and finished the 2008 China League One division campaign in sixth place. In summer 2009, Shanghai East Asia represented the Shanghai football team and took part in the 2009 National Games. Xu Genbao took up the management post himself and led the team to win gold in the men's football tournament. Meanwhile, in the league, Shanghai East Asia chose the 65,000 seater Shanghai Stadium as their home stadium for their 2009 China League One campaign. They finished the season in fourth place and just missed out on promotion by a single win, but it was still considered quite an achievement because that team was made up of players under 20 years old, and with no foreign imports.
  The 2010 league season saw former Chinese international Fan Zhiyi receive his first management job at the club as well as the introduction of their first-ever foreign players in Macedonian Nikola Karçev and Haitian Fabrice Noël. Despite these new signings the club failed to improve upon the previous season's results and finished in fourth place. Failure to gain promotion and financial difficulties caused the club unable to hold onto their rising stars. Before the 2011 season, five of the team's starting players left the club: team captain Wang Jiayu, Chinese international Zhang Linpeng, and Chinese under-23 players Cao Yunding, Jiang Zhipeng, and Gu Chao. In the following 2011 season, Xu Genbao promoted several young players into the first team and the team finished the season in ninth place.