2009 Oct 22 Talking Balls: Dopes, Mopes and Title Hopes
The National Games is just a hotbed of controversy. Last week it was diving being fixed and this week it’s rowers failing dope tests and shouts of shenanigans in the trampolining. Claims that the trampolining was fixed came from He Wennan. The Olympic gold medalist was unhappy at not winning and has since “retracted” her statement.
In good news, Liu Zige broke the World Record in the 200m Butterfly. She can add that to her Olympic Gold.
Ryan Griffiths scored both for Guoan in a 2-0 win over Guangzhou. He then showed the infamous “OK” sign in support of his brother Joel. There are two games left and Guoan could still win the title. Guoan play away in Dalian this weekend. The bad news is that Dalian have only lost once at home this season. Henan Construction, who Guoan lead only on goal difference, plays Tianjin. There are worries that Tianjin may not put up much of a fight, so as to derail Beijing’s title bid. Some worry that Tianjin may even lose 6-0 to Henan so that they can make up the goal difference.
F1 World Champion, Jenson Button will be at the Race of Champions in Beijing. The news is that he will be riding with Suo Ni. The TV presenter won this opportunity at a charity ball. This event has now become even stranger than cars on a football pitch.
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Talking Balls: A Smoking Rocket, Marbury Mania & The Olympic Underground
The Olympics are around the corner, or should we say, further along the line. Transport London, which runs the capital's world-famous Tube, have decided to cash in on the Olympics. They've released a map with a twist: All of the stations are now named after famous Olympians. We admit that it's better than the 2012 mascots but as merchandise goes, it's still pretty bad. There are 13 Chinese Olympians on the map:
Talking Balls: Shame On Shanxi, Ghastly Guoan & Some Sports Shorts
The Beijing Ducks and Shanxi Brave Dragons have gone to game five in their CBA playoff semi-final. The game was originally set for March 14 but was postponed until March 18 so that everyone could enjoy St. Patrick’s Day. No, actually it was put back because of a near-riot in game four. Shanxi’s fans also took that meeting as an opportunity to shower the court with debris. They've been fined nine times for similar incidents over the last four years. They have just added another RMB 60,000 to the CBA's Christmas party fund. You stay classy, Shanxi.
Talking Balls: Ducks Flying, Guoan Too Green & This J-Lin Stuff Gets Silly
Good evening, sports fans. Let's get right into it. The CBA playoffs are at their semi-final stage and Beijing Ducks are back in the series after winning game two. Stephon Marbury dropped a colossal 52 points to send them on their way to besting Shanxi by 132-123. Thanks to NiuBBall for the alley-oop on the video you'll see below. Don't forget to check out the 2011-12 NiuBBall Awards. Spoiler alert: Starbury gets what he deserves.
Talking Balls: CSL Madness, CBA Badness, Le Sulk's Gladness & Yet More Jeremy Lin
Another week and another deluge of Jeremy Lin coverage. It's about time that you became a fan as he's going to be the subject of a lot of column inches for the foreseeable future. You can say what you want about the boy (and some people notably have) but he's got people talking about the Knicks for the first time since Patrick Ewing. Here are some of the Lin stories from the last week: China Sports Review wonder whether he's on CCTV enough, the Guardian get their right-on knickers in a twist on behalf of Asian Americans and China Daily have wrapped up all of the coverage on Jeremy Lin ever (and it is in Comic Sans).
Talking Balls: Lintelligent Puns, The Elk's Arrival & Games Galore
What another lincredible week for Jeremy Lin. He’s gone from "novelty to Knicks star" in almost a linstant and now there’s lots of linterest in him on the linternet. His name is also the kind that the media love in their sports stars – it is very easy to bend into very bad puns. Wordplay aside this young man has got game. Just not as much as Yao according to NBA supremo David Stern. There’s lots more coverage of JLin all over the web. There's USA Today’s article on Asian stereotypes in coverage of the Knicks’ guard, another on Lin being happy to smash stereotypes and the news that people are already trying to turn this hype into profit. Hell, it's even got to Beijing Boyce. Anyway, here's Jeremy larking about off the court ...
