Footage of maskless fans packed into Qatar’s stadiums for the World Cup is putting China — facing rising discontent over its continuing strict COVID-19 protocols — in a bind.
Footage reviewed by Bloomberg News and shared on social media appear to show state broadcaster China Central Television pulling back on footage of the stadium crowds compared with other international networks. While not removing them completely, CCTV often substitutes crowd close-ups with video of coaches, the team bench or anything other than the thousands of jubilant or despondent fans.
The World Cup is the first major international sporting event taking place in an atmosphere of relaxed COVID-19 measures, following stricter protocols at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and the 2022 Beijing Winter Games. That’s forced broadcasters such as CCTV to resort to a familiar playbook, making use of a 30-second delay on the games that gives censors more time to respond to anything that might be looked down upon in Beijing.