Category: Sports

(Xinhua)15:16, April 05, 2019

As many as 7,500 runners from 10 countries will feature the 2019 Mandiri Yogya Marathon in Yogyakarta province later this month, the organizing committee said here on Thursday.

The participating countries include China, the United States, France, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, India, Kenya, Ireland and hosts Indonesia, said Rudi As Aturiridha, spokesman of Bank Mandiri, the sponsor and the committee of the international sport event.

The event is scheduled to be held at the compound of Prambanan temple on April 28, he said.

The event was also expected to help promote tourism and cultural sectors in the province, as the runners would pass through a route which offers beautiful scenery along its sides, said Rudi.

The event will include a 5k, 10k, 21k, and 42k, said Pandu Buntaran, another committee member at the event.

The start will take place in Roro Jongrang square and will finish at Prambanan Temple.

(Xinhua)15:19, April 05, 2019

Madeleine Michele of Cameroon celebrates during the match between Cameroon and Croatia at the 2019 International Womens Football Tournament in Wuhan, central Chinas Hubei Province, April 4, 2019. (Xinhua/Cheng Min)

The Cameroon womens football team snatched a 2-1 victory over Croatia to open a four-nation invitational tournament here on Thursday.

Forward Madeleine Michele Ngono-Mani tabbed in to break the deadlock in the 33rd minute after wasting a couple of chances.

Croatia equalized in 64th minute through defender Izabela Lojna, just seven minutes after Ivana Rudelics goal was ruled offside.

Cameroon, however, put themselves ahead on the scoreboard after Henriette Michelle Akaba-Edoa kicked in Gabrielle Aboudi Onguenes cross in the 83rd minute.

The Indomitable Lionesses, whose squad included 12 players based overseas, earned free kicks in the 25th and 27th minute with the latter just from a little bit out of the box, but both Therese Abena and Aboudi Onguene missed their chance to score.

With the victory, Cameroon sealed a spot in Sundays final and will vie for the trophy against the winners between hosts China and Russia, who face off later Thursday.

The tournament in Wuhan is the first international games for Cameroon after they qualified for the Womens World Cup through the 2018 Womens Africa Cup of Nations in Ghana last December.

China is the only other team in the four-nation tourney that has made a berth to the finals this summer in France.

(Xinhua)10:04, April 09, 2019

BEIJING, April 8 (Xinhua) — As the host nation of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing, China hopes to reap more than five gold medals and to compete in all the 109 events, a winter sports expert told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.

Zhu Chengyi, a former official from Chinas General Administration of Sport, acknowledged that neither objective would be easily achieved, and that arduous preparation would be required in order to meet those goals.

Chinas best Winter Olympics medal count came in Vancouver in 2010, with five golds, two silvers and four bronzes, but it only bagged one gold, six silvers and two bronzes in PyeongChang last year.

In order to surpass the five-gold mark, we have to make breakthroughs in other events, and not rely solely on our traditional strongholds, said Zhu. For the 2022 Games, we are hopeful of medaling in short track, figure skating, skiing aerials, halfpipe and speed skating.

Chinese athletes had a disappointing 2018-19 season, with the countrys only gold medal coming courtesy Sui Wenjing and Han Cong in the pairs competition at the World Figure Skating Championships.

Chinas short track skaters missed the top of the podium, collecting only three silvers and one bronze at the World Short Track Championships, while arch rival South Korea scooped seven of the 10 golds on offer.

Cai Xuetong got a silver at the Snowboarding World Championships and Xue Mengtao only settled for a bronze medal in the freestyle skiing aerials.

In the Curling World Championships, neither Chinese men nor women made it to the last four.

However, we have other medal hopefuls, as the Beijing Winter Games introduces the new events of short track mixed relay and freestyle skiing mixed team aerials, said Zhu.

As for competing in all 109 events, Were quite sure of qualifying for some 60 events, but have to make greater efforts in order to reach the Olympic qualifying standards in the other 50 events, said Zhu.

With less than three years left until Beijing 2022, China is standing at a critical juncture. In order to meet our goals, we must work together and ensure our preparation is thorough, Zhu concluded.

(Peoples Daily Overseas New Media)15:44, April 11, 2019

Baseball, a well-loved sport by many across the world, is nudging its way into the Chinese mainland, where the popular sport remains a niche one.

There are only 720 registered professional baseball players and 45 national referees, according to Yi Sheng, deputy secretary-general of the China Baseball Association. Some 40 to 50 first-level referees can be found in highly-developed areas, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, and Shenzhen, Beijing Youth Daily reported.

Even the highest level baseball league, the China Baseball League, only had six teams last year. The total match schedule only lasted for seven days and there are no home and away stadiums. All teams played their matches on the same field, according to the newspaper.

Though the sport has yet to take off in China, it is gradually picking up pace among youth.

At present, nearly 500 primary and high schools offer baseball courses and related training, covering about 20,000 students. In addition, many children play in amateur clubs outside of school. Some have also attended training sessions hosted by the Major League Baseball (MLB), which has set up three development centers in eastern China’s Jiangsu province.

Li Wei, a baseball coach with 15 years of experience, said about one-fifth of the students trained may become a professional player. However, the percentage could reach 60% due to its development in China.

Yi Jian, one of those young men trained by Li, began pursuing his baseball dream at the age of nine. At first, he saw it as a way to out of school work, but he soon found that the constant training and his school classes took up most his time, leaving only the Spring Festival available for him to rest.

“I never thought about giving up. It’s hard to be a professional player. But my mother told me that I can choose my own way as long as I keep trying and never give up,” Yin said. His hard work paid off when he managed to pass the test at a MLB center and signed contract with MLB team Milwaukee Brewers together with three other young players from the Chinese mainland.

There are more children involved in baseball, observed Zhang Hongmei, a baseball training industry insider. But the cost remains relatively high as it takes nearly 30,000 yuan to train a single student every year.

(Xinhua)17:30, April 11, 2019

BEIJING, April 11 (Xinhua) — World news agencies have very high expectations of Beijing 2022, said Anthony Edgar, head of International Olympic Committee media operations, at the first World Agency Meeting of the Games which concluded here on Thursday.

Beijing has already hosted the 2008 Olympic Games, which all of the worlds media came to and which was very successful, Edgar told Xinhua. The agencies have very high expectations of Beijing 2022.

The first World Agency Meeting of Beijing 2022 assembled representatives from major world agencies including the Associated Press, Reuters, Agence France-Presse and Kyodo News.

We know already that you know how to build wonderful venues and to put on a great games. And of course, what we need to work together on is to help you with how to run a winter games, he said.

They (the agencies) are here to see Beijing in winter conditions, and especially to see the Alpine venues and to meet the new staff that will be working on Beijing 2022, he added.

IOC honorary president Juan Antonio Samaranch said that the international media more than anyone else measure the success of the Games and Edgar agrees.

The Media operations of Beijing 2022 should make sure that the media can do its job, he said.

The scale of press operations at an Olympic Games is huge. Over 6,000 print and online media will work at the MPC, and each competition venue. For larger International News Agencies, an Olympic Games means a deployment of a huge amount of staff and resources. Information on every sport event (including real-time results and athlete biographies) should be found on the Games INFO service, easily accessed online or in the media work rooms.

While China has organized Olympic Summer Games in 2008 and Summer Youth Olympic Games in 2014, hosting a Winter Games is a different animal entirely.

(The weather at) Beijing 2008 was very hot, while Beijing 2022 will be very cold, in the mountains especially, Edgar said. The photographers, the cameraman, the reporters will have to deal with very cold temperatures.

So the organizing committee needs to make sure that the media are well looked after, and then their communications are working properly, he added.

With the explosion of the Internet, the demand for an accurate, fast and unbiased Olympic news service has never been stronger. To this end, the IOC has produced the Olympic Information Service (OIS).

The OIS does not do the job of the media, Edgar said. But what it does is having its reporters in every single venue, doing interviews with athletes, doing reports on all of the sports, all of the athletes, all of the countries and regions, so that the media can cover these sports wherever they are.

IOC President Thomas Bach announced in January that the IOC had recognized Xinhua News Agency as an international news agency, alongside AP, AFP and Reuters.

Edgar said that the decision was made due to Xinhuas increasing participation in promoting the Olympic Movement around the world.

Its a very important recognition. For over thirty years, the IOC only recognize AFP, AP and Reuters as international news agencies, and it now also recognizes Xinhua.

Theres a number of reasons for that. And the main one is Chinas participation in the Olympic Games. China also has become one of the biggest countries in the world. And Xinhua is one of the largest news agencies in the world with bureaus all over the world.

Xinhua is producing content not just in Chinese for a Chinese market, but also producing content of multiple languages for an international market, he said.

(Xinhua)13:32, April 15, 2019

LOS ANGELES, April 15 (Xinhua) — Tiger Woods captured his 15th major title with an epic back-nine rally in the final round at the U.S. Masters Tournament on Sunday, making a mighty comeback after his 11-year major drought.

In the front nine, the 43-year-old American superstar started one shot behind Italian golfer Francesco Molinari after a birdie on No. 3, but fell back to three behind after bogeys on No. 4 and 5. Woods ended the front nine in 1-under while Molinari is at even par.

On the back nine, the leaderboard began to change fast. After Tiger made back-to-back birdies on No. 15 and 16, he gained a two-shot advantage over Dustin Johnson, Xander Schauffele and Brooks Koepka. Finally, Woods sealed the final with a one-shot lead and won his first Masters title since 2005.

This is Tigers 15th Grand Slam title and 81st PGA Tour title, marking a big step forward in a career plagued by injugolfries and personal scandals.

(China Daily)11:01, May 02, 2019

Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino admitted he was at fault as Ajax closed in on a first Champions League final for 23 years thanks to a 1-0 semifinal first-leg victory at Spurs on Tuesday.

Donny van de Beeks 15th-minute strike was just reward for the Dutch sides first-half dominance as Tottenham badly missed the presence of the injured Harry Kane and suspended Son Heung-min.

However, considering its dominance, Ajax was left feeling frustrated that it hadnt amassed a bigger lead for next Wednesdays second leg in Amsterdam.

In the first 20 minutes we played really good, 22-year-old midfielder van de Beek said, and after that Tottenham chased something.

Spurs improved after the break despite another injury blow as Belgian defender Jan Vertonghen had to be helped down the tunnel after a sickening head knock.

However, the host lacked the inspiration needed to get back on level terms without their two top scorers.

Watching now of course I can accept it was a mistake the shape we used. But there were not too many options, said Pochettino.

I am not happy, but our lack of energy from the beginning made our game difficult. We were a little sloppy.

Despite the tender age of many of its players, Ajax has not been fazed on the road in Europe, shocking Real Madrid and Juventus away to reach the last four. And it started confidently again in north London.

A through-ball by Hakim Ziyech, a silky skilled Moroccan midfielder who has been linked with Tottenham, picked out van de Beek who took his time to leave goalkeeper Hugo Lloris prone before slotting into the bottom corner.

I think it was an amazing evening, an amazing result, said Ajax coach Erik ten Hag.

In the beginning we very strong, we were completely dominating the game and we made a fantastic goal.

Lloris kept his side in the game 10 minutes later from another van de Beek effort as Ajax threatened to run riot.

The way we conceded the goal was so painful, I think we were so poor in this action, said Pochettino.

They showed more energy than us, but I think after 30 minutes we started to equalize the game.

Injuries pile up

On top of Kane and Son, Spurs were shorn of the injured Erik Lamela and Harry Winks and lost another key player when Vertonghen came off worst as he contested a high ball with Ajax goalkeeper Andre Onana and teammate Toby Alderweireld.

The Belgian was patched up and briefly returned to the field before being helped down the tunnel. That led to questions as to why the Spurs medical staff had allowed him to continue in the first place.

I wasnt involved, insisted Pochettino. It is the doctors decision.

I think (the health of the player) is so important, the protocol is there and our medical staff follow the protocol.

Despite that latest blow, the host reacted well to end the half on top with Vertonghens replacement, Moussa Sissoko, driving a longrange effort wide.

Pochettinos halftime pep talk had the desired effect as Spurs dug deep into their energy reserves to raise the tempo and intensity of their display after the break.

Yet, the quality needed in the final third to get back on level terms was missing without Kane and Son.

We arrived in the last third but we didnt find a way to create clear chances, continued Pochettino. Always we missed the last pass or shot.

Ajax did not make the most of its chances on the break to kill the tie off, but was unfortunate when David Neres effort back across Lloris left the French stopper helpless only for the ball to rebound back off the post.

We could have kept the ball more and played calmer and that creates opportunities, said ten Hag.

With, for instance, Neres that he didnt score that was such a pity. Nevertheless, winning 1-0 in Tottenham is an amazing result.

We know we can do a lot better next week to finish it off.

Son will be back for the trip to Amsterdam next Wednesday and Spurs will hope the South Korean can repeat his double away to Manchester City in the last eight, but Ajax is in pole position for a final against Barcelona or Liverpool on June 1 in Madrid.

(Xinhua)09:52, May 08, 2019

YINCHUAN, Northwest China, May 7 (Xinhua) — In the middle of a piece of rough yellow land, a brand-new football field is particularly eye-catching. Abdumijit Emet is here training boys and girls from his school in passing and catching, dribbling, weaving through poles and shooting.

With sweat dripping down their faces, love for football is palpable among these young players.

I didnt know how to play football until Emet came, and now I am a big fan of it, said Wang Ningbo, 13, a student from Jiangtai Middle School of Xiji County, northwest Chinas Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

Emet, from Kashgar in Chinas Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, is still a second year postgraduate student at Fudan University in Shanghai. In August of 2018, he came to Jiangtai Middle School as a volunteer teacher.

Xiji County, along with several other counties, is called Xihaigu, one of the worlds most uninhabitable places due to its dry climate, high mountains and harsh environment.

It is not easy to find a flat piece of land in the Xihaigu area. For this reason, basketball has become the mainstream sport for local people. The girls basketball team of Jiangtai Middle School once won the championship in a regional basketball match, but the school has never had a football team.

Emet has enjoyed playing football since childhood, and when he went to Beijing and Shanghai to study, football was still his biggest interest. Even after he came to this rural school, he still could not keep his feet away from football. Every time he played football, some students would join him out of curiosity.

They like it and I found that some of the kids were very talented, which gave me the idea to form a football team, he said.

With the support of the school, Jiangtai Middle School had its first-ever boys football team, which was also the first middle school football team in the towns of Xiji County. The teams first training was on the schools basketball court, and it was surrounded by crowds.

After the training, several girls started to pester him to set up a girls team as well. He was hesitant at first, but eventually relented.

I said yes at last, but did not expect so many applicants. I had to hold a fitness test. Many of the eliminated girls cried, Emet said.

Playing football on an existing basketball court was quite inconvenient, so Emet decided to move to a new field about 500 meters away from the school, which was built in February last year and is the only football field in the towns of Xiji.

Lei Qin, 15, cherished her chance to join the team.

Playing football makes me happy, and I want to get familiar with the moves and improve my skills as soon as possible, she said.

Happiness is what Emet wants to bring to the kids through football.

They started late, and it is unrealistic to turn them into professional athletes. I just hope football could enrich the extracurricular life of those kids, bring joy to them as they grow up, and allow some kids to find confidence on the pitch, said Emet.

It is not easy for a football team to start from scratch in the mountains. The team holds training twice a week on the pitch, and Emet corrects the kids moves one by one. He searches for information, produces PowerPoint slides and makes lesson plans to teach the rules of football, training methods and tactics.

Emet is a big fan of Shanghai SIPG Football club, so he brought their story to the club management and was met with success. In the upcoming summer vacation, Emet will take some players to Shanghai to watch a game of Shanghai SIPG and meet the professional players.

I am happy to see that within just half a year, these kids have fallen in love with football, Emet said.

This July, Emet will complete his voluntary teaching, and the football team will be taken over by Zhang Guowu, the schools PE teacher.

Although a specialist in basketball, Zhang says he is ready to meet the challenge ahead.

It is not easy to set up a football team in rural schools. Football makes these kids happy and has taught them the meaning of perseverance. I will do my best to make the team better and better, said Zhang. .

(Xinhua)09:53, May 08, 2019

BEIJING, May 7 (Xinhua) — Beijing Organizing Committee of Winter Olympic Games (BOCWOG) released Tuesday 15 short introductory videos about Winter Olympic sports.

These videos tell fans about events like speed skating, figure skating, Alpine skiing, freestyle skiing, bobsleigh and luge, including knowledges of event history, venues, equipment, competition rules and highlights.

Yan Cheng, head of Department of Human Resources of BOCWOG, authorized the broadcasting rights to CCTV-5 Sports, Beijing TV Station (BTV) and Hebei Television Station (HEBTV).

These are the first batch of educational videos whose IPR are owned by China.

Yan said BOCWOG is aiming to uphold the Olympic spirit, enlarge the fan population and promote the winter sports in China. Each video is a 4-minute introductory documentary, which is an achievement of experts, organizers and producers.

According to Yan, any individual, agency or organization can use these films free of charge in non-profit causes and activities. The videos are strictly prohibited for commercial purposes.

(Xinhua)10:16, May 09, 2019

GOLDEN COAST, Australia, May 9 (Xinhua) — Southwestern Chinese city Chengdu won the bid to host the 2025 World Games at the 2019 International World Games Association (IWGA) Congress here on Thursday.