NEW TAIPEI CITY, Taiwan: When Wang Wei-chen had a base hit for the Chinatrust Brothers, no one booed or cheered from the stands at the suburban Taipei ballpark. No one hurled insults at the umpires. And no one yelled the Chinese-language line of encouragement “add oil” to either team.
The 12,150 blue plastic seats were devoid of fans Friday night for the game between Chinatrust Brothers and Fubon Guardians, down from the average crowd of 6,000 at professional baseball games in Taiwan. No fans have come to any games here since play started on April 11.
Taiwan’s five-team Chinese Professional Baseball League is barring spectators over concerns of spreading the coronavirus in a crowded space. But Taiwan has relatively few cases of COVID-19, so the league decided it was safe to let in players, coaches, cheerleaders, costumed mascots, face mask-wearing batboys and the media.
“We’d like to have fans coming into the stadium to cheer us on, yet due to the outbreak they can’t,” said Wang, an infielder for Brothers. “We are still lucky, since we have not stopped our season and people can still see us in this way.”
Other baseball leagues around the world have been postponed to May or later. Beyond baseball, organized sports worldwide have canceled or delayed competition. The Tokyo Olympics have been pushed back a year.
At the Taiwan ballpark, about 150 placards were placed upright on the seats. They wished luck to particular players from the Guardians home team, some with cut-out effigies, and thanked Taiwan’s medical personnel for keeping coronavirus caseloads low on the Western Pacific island.
Rock and roll sounds blasted out of the bleachers as if in a normal game, and players did some cheering for their teammates to replace the din of fans.
“I think it feels like a real game,” said Mac Huang, a longtime baseball fan and middle school teacher in Taipei who is following the league now online. Fan-less games, he said, are “a good way to stop coronavirus, but no one knows when coronavirus will stop, and it’s good to have the games on anyway.”
League officials delayed the season twice from its originally scheduled opening day on March 14, and only started competition after close consultation with the Ministry of Health and Welfare. They’re ready to allow all 240 regular games in empty parks through the season’s end in mid-November, if needed.
Taiwan has had just 428 coronavirus cases among a population of 23 million. Bars, restaurants, shops and schools still run normally. Taiwan has limited the spread by imposing flight restrictions and through contact tracing of anyone who comes near a confirmed patient.
“We have to be grateful to Taiwan’s citizens for keeping the outbreak under control and let us do this,” league commissioner Wu Chih-yang said.
To keep fans watching on their phones, PCs and TVs, the league is encouraging teams to give their stadiums a realistic, lively feel. That’s where the placards and cheerleaders come in. Online game commentary is being broadcast in English as well as Chinese this year in case fans overseas want to watch a live season.
“Because there is so much room up there in the stands, it leaves space for creativity and each team can be creative as it wishes,” the commissioner said.
Teams are still making some money from broadcast games, he added. The league charges a subscription fee for online viewers.
In Taiwan’s Taoyuan city, the unbeaten Rakuten Monkeys are charming fans by placing 40 mannequins in the stands — to be sent to local clothing stores once their duties are done. Stadium seats support four long LED-lit display boards that twinkle with slogans to inspire base hits and home runs.
The Monkeys, last season’s champions, deploy six robots to bang drums along with the cheerleaders. Fans are excited enough that about 50 of them have sponsored the LED boards, cheer squad leader Eric Chiu said.
A Monkeys game on April 15 attracted about 650,000 viewers in different countries, according to the Taiwan government-backed Central News Agency.
“They think what we’re doing now is OK, but we still hope this outbreak passes soon,” Chiu said. “It’s better to have the fans back.”
Guardians manager Hong I-chung is less sure.
“If you ask the players, they won’t find it so different actually,” Hong told reporters before Friday’s game. “They need to focus on the field, and often noise from fans can throw off their state of mind.”
He particularly noted the impact of players being “scolded” by comments from fans in the stands.
Other people on the field Friday said they were ready to play as usual. Pre-game chatter with reporters focused more on hitting, pitching and lineups than on the lack of fans or Taiwan baseball’s world outlier status. The Brothers won 11-0.
“The fact that were playing in front of empty seats, that’s fine, we’re still playing the game, getting the opportunity to come out here and play,” said Rob Ducey, a former Major League Baseball outfielder who is now a hitting coach for the Guardians.
Baseball in full swing in Taiwan, even in empty stadiums
https://arab.news/gx3zn
Baseball in full swing in Taiwan, even in empty stadiums

- Taiwan has relatively few cases of COVID-19
- But the Chinese Professional Baseball League is barring spectators
Why the US might finally start calling soccer ‘football’

It is the world’s most popular sport and yet there is still debate over what it should actually be called.
Is it football or soccer?
US President Donald Trump waded into the topic while at the Club World Cup final in New Jersey last Sunday. He joked that he could pass an executive order to bring the United States in line with much of the rest of the world and ensure that from now on Americans refer to it as football.
“I think I could do that,” he said with a smile during an interview with host broadcaster DAZN.
It was a light-hearted comment, but at a time when the US is playing an increasingly significant role in soccer the question of why Americans continue to call it by a different name to the one by which it is most commonly known has been raised again.
“They call it football, we call it soccer. I’m not sure that change could be made very easily,” Trump said.
Soccer keeps growing in the US and so does its influence on the sport. It is co-hosting the men’s World Cup with Canada and Mexico next year — the third year in a row that it stages a major tournament after the 2024 Copa America and this summer’s Club World Cup.
Other factors are keeping soccer more often in the US consciousness — and perhaps they will make saying ”football” more commonplace in a tough sporting landscape.
One of the greatest players of all time, Lionel Messi, plays for MLS team Inter Miami; the popularity of the Premier League and Champions League is booming; and the documentary series “Welcome to Wrexham” about a low-level Welsh club co-owned by Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, has attracted new eyeballs.
Don’t blame Americans for calling it soccer
Despite “soccer” being widely associated with the US, it is commonly accepted that the word was actually coined in Britain, perhaps as far back as the 1880s.
The exact date when it was first used is not known, but it is believed “soccer” was derived from “association football,” which was the first official name of the sport.
The charity English Heritage says the nickname may have first been used by pupils at the iconic Harrow School to “distinguish the new association game from their older pursuit, known as ‘footer.’”
Numerous versions of football began to flourish, often involving handling a ball more than kicking it. One example dating back to the 1600s and still played today in England is Royal Shrovetide. Rugby is another example.
The English Football Association was created in 1863 and drew up codified rules for associated football to set it apart from other versions being played elsewhere in Britain and, from there, soccer as we know it was born.
Dr. Stefan Szymanski, a professor of sport management at the University of Michigan, co-wrote the book “It’s Football, Not Soccer ” and explored the origins of the name. In a lecture to the American University of Beirut in 2019 he said soccer was “very clearly a word of English/British origin.”
“And bear in mind that the name ‘association football’ doesn’t really appear until the 1870s,” he said, “so it appears really very early on in the history of the game and the word ‘soccer’ has been used over and over again since it was coined at the end of the 19th century.”
Soccer was a commonly used term in Britain
“Soccer” is not a commonly used term in Britain these days but that has not always been the case.
It was the title of a popular Saturday morning television show, “Soccer AM,” which ran from 1994 to 2023 on the Premier League’s host broadcaster Sky Sports.
England great and 1966 World Cup winner Bobby Charlton ran popular schools for decades, titled “Bobby Charlton’s Soccer School.”
And Matt Busby — Manchester United’s iconic manager who won the 1968 European Cup — titled his autobiography, which was published in 1974, “Soccer at the Top, My Life in Football.”
That book title suggests the terms “soccer” and “football” were interchangeable in British culture at that time.
Perhaps the word ‘soccer’ isn’t the real problem
Szymanski suggested the problem some people have with “soccer” isn’t the word at all. But rather that it is specifically used in America.
“It’s when Americans use this word that we get the outpourings of distress and horror, and one of the most popular thoughts that people throw at this is to say that American football is not really football,” he said in his lecture.
He argued that given the overwhelming popularity of the NFL in the US it makes perfect sense to differentiate between soccer and its own version of football.
Not just Americans call it soccer
The use of the word “soccer” is a bit more confused in other countries.
Australia, which has its own Australian rules football along with both rugby codes, commonly uses the term and its national men’s team are known as the Socceroos. It’s soccer federation, however, is called Football Australia.
It’s a similar situation in Ireland, where Gaelic football is popular. The term “soccer” is used but the national soccer team is still governed by a body called the Football Association of Ireland.
Canada, like the US simply calls it soccer, which clearly distinguishes it from the NFL and Canadian Football League.
The Associated Press stylebook says soccer is the preferred term in the US but notes that “around the world the sport is referred to as football.”
La Liga, Thmanyah sign partnership to boost quality of Saudi football broadcasts

- Agreement signed in London
LONDON: Riyadh Season announced on Thursday its sponsorship of a strategic partnership between La Liga and Thmanyah, the exclusive broadcaster of Saudi football competitions, in an initiative aimed at enhancing the audiovisual production standards of the Saudi Pro League.
The agreement was signed in London by Faisal Bafarat, CEO of the General Entertainment Authority, on behalf of Riyadh Season; Javier Tebas, the president of La Liga; and Abdulrahman Abumalih, founder and CEO of Thmanyah, a subsidiary of the Saudi Research and Media Group. The signing ceremony was attended by SRMG’s CEO Jomana Al-Rashed.

Under the agreement La Liga will provide technical consultancy to elevate production quality across SPL broadcasts. Areas of focus include improved camera positioning, signal configuration, and audio systems, along with enhanced lighting distribution in stadiums. The collaboration will also develop a technical production manual and introduce modern broadcast workflows.
Another key element of the partnership involves training programs designed to upskill local production teams and ensure the sustainable transfer of knowledge. La Liga will also work closely with Saudi stakeholders to formulate a robust anti-piracy strategy to protect premium sports and entertainment content across the Kingdom.
Turki Alalshikh, the head of the GEA and Riyadh Season, described the move as a continuation of Riyadh Season’s commitment to extending its global footprint.
He noted that last year’s sponsorship of La Liga marked a key milestone in that journey, with the latest partnership further reinforcing the season’s impact across sports and entertainment sectors.
Tebas said: “We are pleased to join forces with Riyadh Season and Thmanyah to enhance the audiovisual production standards of the Saudi Pro League.
“We already have a strong working relationship, and we look forward to building on that to deliver world-class broadcast experiences. At La Liga we are committed to sharing our knowledge and expertise to support football’s global growth, and this initiative is an important step forward for Saudi football’s international visibility.”
Scheffler makes bright British Open start before McIlroy takes center stage

- Scheffler, though, is well-placed to launch his challenge for a fourth major and a first Claret Jug despite a series of wayward tee shots
- McIlroy is the star attraction for the close to 280,000 spectators set to attend the four days of play
PORTRUSH, UK: World number one Scottie Scheffler made a fine start to the British Open with a three-under par round at a rain-swept Royal Portrush on Thursday before home favorite Rory McIlroy began his tournament in front of huge crowds.
Former US Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick, China’s Li Haotong and Dane Jacob Skov Olesen hold the clubhouse lead at four under par after enjoying the better of the weather conditions in early tee-off times.
Scheffler, though, is well-placed to launch his challenge for a fourth major and a first Claret Jug despite a series of wayward tee shots.
The American hit just three fairways but still produced one of the best rounds of the day thanks to his brilliant approach play.
“When it’s raining sideways, it’s actually, believe it or not, not that easy to get the ball in the fairway. Thank you guys all for pointing that out,” he told reporters.
Scheffler raised eyebrows with his pre-tournament comments that his is “not a fulfilling life” due to his relentless quest for more success.
He battled his way through the first 15 holes at one under thanks to birdies at the third, seventh and 10th before finding his touch with another birdie at the “Calamity Corner” 16th and nearly holing an approach for eagle at the 17th.
Scheffler is aiming to become only the second player to win the British Open when ranked the world number one after Tiger Woods, who achieved that feat on three occasions.
Shane Lowry, champion when the British Open returned to Portrush for the first time in 68 years in 2019, and two-time major champion Jon Rahm finished at one under.
Defending champion Xander Schauffele is one further back at even par as he seeks to refind his top form after a frustrating 2025 so far.
McIlroy’s attempt to win a second Open Championship on his return to Northern Ireland takes center stage in the afternoon action.
The world number two is determined to make amends for his disastrous start at Portrush six years ago when a quadruple bogey at the opening hole, on his way to a first-round 79, saw him miss the cut.
McIlroy is the star attraction for the close to 280,000 spectators set to attend the four days of play at the final major of the year and showed signs of nerves as a wayward tee shot at the first led to an opening hole bogey.
But he bounced back immediately to pick up a shot at the par-five second before birdies at the fifth, seventh and 10th took the Masters champion to three under with eight holes to play.
McIlroy’s charge, though, could be disrupted by warnings of thunderstorms set to strike the north Irish coast.
Earlier, Lee Westwood rolled back the years with an impressive 69 that promised even more until two bogeys on the final five holes.
The 52-year-old, widely regarded as one of the best players never to win a major, came through qualifying to make his first Open Championship appearance since 2022.
“I love the Open Championship and I love Portrush,” said the Englishman. “That’s part of the reason why I tried to qualify.”
Two-time champion Padraig Harrington of Ireland was handed the honor of getting the tournament underway with the opening tee shot at 6:35 am local time.
“The grandstand was full, the first fairway was full, the first green was full,” said Harrington. “Those crowds were spectacular at that hour of the morning. It was really great.”
Luka Modric won’t stand for the mediocrity that his new club AC Milan displayed last season

- “Milan cannot be satisfied with average,” Modric told Milan TV
- “When I grew up, I used to watch a lot of the Italian league and Milan was my favorite team”
MILAN: Luka Modric grew up supporting AC Milan because his idol and fellow Croat, Zvonimir Boban, played for the club.
And because Milan in the 1990s were one of the strongest teams in Europe.
So now that the 39-year-old former Ballon d’Or winner has joined the Rossoneri after 13 seasons at Real Madrid, he won’t stand for the mediocrity that Milan displayed last season for an eighth-placed finish in Serie A that excluded the squad from Europe this coming season.
“Milan cannot be satisfied with average,” Modric told Milan TV. “They need to have (the) biggest goals possible, to win titles, to compete with the best teams in the world. And that’s why I’m here.”
Modric was shown a photo of himself wearing a Milan warmup suit as a child.
“When I grew up, I used to watch a lot of the Italian league and Milan was my favorite team,” he said.
“At the time in Croatia we followed Milan a lot because they were one of the most popular clubs in the world. And also because there was Zvonimir Boban who was my idol.”
On Monday, Modric signed a one-year contract with Milan that includes an option for another season.
“I wanted to stay in Europe, continue playing competitive football,” he said. “I had some other offers but when Milan showed up for me it was clear from the first moment … What also impressed me (was) how (sporting) director Igli Tare came to Croatia to present me the project.”
Milan rehired Massimiliano Allegri as the coach after last season, replacing the fired Sergio Conceicao. Allegri won the Italian league for the first time with Milan in 2011, then guided Juventus to five straight titles from 2015-19. Tare was also hired recently.
“What I want to bring there is to win, to help my teammates in every aspect, to work hard, to earn my place in the team,” Modric said.
“Nothing can come easy in your life. You have to work. You have to fight.”
With Milan winger Rafael Leão holding onto the No. 10 shirt, Modric will return to the No. 14 he once wore for Croatia and at Tottenham.
Leão was the Serie A MVP when Milan won the league in 2022 but has since performed inconsistently and clashed with the team managers.
“Leão,” Modric said, “is the present and future of Milan.”
Three-time Grand Slam finalist Jabeur announces break from tennis

- Tunisia’s Jabeur has struggled with her form in recent months
- “Right now, I feel it’s time to take a step back and finally put myself first,” she said
TUNIS: Three-time Grand Slam finalist Ons Jabeur is taking a break from competitive tennis, the 30-year-old said in a social media post on Thursday.
Tunisia’s Jabeur, the first Arab woman to reach a Grand Slam final, has struggled with her form in recent months, failing to get past the third round of a major this year.
The two-time Wimbledon finalist’s campaign came to a disappointing end at the All England Club last month as she retired from her first-round clash against Viktoriya Tomova, unable to continue after a long medical timeout.
The former world number two suffers from asthma and experienced breathing difficulties at this year’s Australian Open.
Jabeur, often called the ‘minister of happiness’ for her cheerful personality, said she was not feeling truly happy on the court.
“For the past two years, I’ve been pushing myself so hard, fighting through injuries and facing many other challenges. But deep down, I haven’t truly felt happy on the court for some time now,” she said in a statement.
“Tennis is such a beautiful sport. But right now, I feel it’s time to take a step back and finally put myself first: to breathe, to heal, and to rediscover the joy of simply living.”
Jabeur, married to former fencer Karim Kamoun, has also been open about her wish to start a family.
“Thank you to all my fans for understanding. Your support and love mean the world to me. I carry it with me always,” she added.