While Euro 2020 did see full stadiums towards the end, the 2022 FIFA World Cup will represent the first time than many nations have taken part in a major tournament unaffected by covid since 2018.
Of course, much of the world has all but moved from from the coronavirus pandemic. International travel is very much back in full flow, with few countries still employing restrictions to combat the virus.
China is an exception.
The Chinese government is still pursuing a 'zero covid' policy, resulting in various restrictions being in place across the country. A number of areas in China are currently under lockdown, with citizens being forced to test for the virus everyday.
A number of protests have broken out in recent times, something that intensified after ten people died in a fire in a building in that Xinjiang region that was under a covid lockdown.
Despite this, the government and leader Xi Jinping seem set to continue with their current policy. As it turns out, it has even affected the broadcasting of the World Cup in the country.
China applies covid censorship to World Cup matches
The 2022 FIFA World Cup is being broadcast in China, although the pictures that are appearing on their screens are slightly different to what you will see elsewhere. It all seems to be related to the covid restrictions in the country.
The Chinese government broadcaster that is showing the tournament has applied a 32-second delay to their feed in order to edit the shots on screen.
It appears as though they have removed any pictures of maskless fans in at the games, most likely to avoid further civil unrest as their citizens compare their covid restrictions to those being used elsewhere. Instead, they simply cut to wide shots of players or managers and avoid showing close up images of the stands.
You can see the policy in action below.
So I thought it was BS that China’s govt broadcaster was censoring shots of fans at the World Cup due to lockdown anger back home. But it’s true.
Here are live feeds from SBS & CCTV (which has a 32 second delay). As @DreyerChina explained, CCTV avoids crowd close ups: pic.twitter.com/wWui0cTdkC— Bill Birtles (@billbirtles) November 27, 2022
Here is another example.
Some people still refusing to see this, so decided to track it. Within a minute, there was this: close-up shots of Canadian and Croatian fans on BBC/international feed, replaced by a solo shot of Canadian coach John Herdman on CCTV. pic.twitter.com/V3DZRjHrzk
— Mark Dreyer (@DreyerChina) November 27, 2022
I couldn’t believe it til I checked but, amidst #ZeroCovid protests here, #China Central Television (CCTV) is editing out close ups of spectators in its coverage of the World Cup so Chinese viewers don’t see thousands of fans without masks in the stands. Only crowd wide shots. pic.twitter.com/CKY33F3ztb
— Stephen McDonell (@StephenMcDonell) November 28, 2022
Absolutely bizarre.
Of course, the Chinese government are known to heavily censor media that appears in the country.
In saying that, this is certainly one of the stranger examples of the policy in action.
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