Cricket confuses Chinese fans

Rizwan Ali of the Associated Press was at the first ever cricket match at the Asian Games, played between the women’s teams of China and Malaysia. Ali says the fans in the stadium were confused by the rules but China may just pick up a medal in the sport after India decided not to send a team to the Games.

The Chinese spectators were so unaware about the rules of the game that they waited for the announcements — made both in Chinese and English languages — before they cheered their team. They rarely broke that trend, even waiting for the announcement before putting their hands together during the seven boundaries scored in the home team’s innings and six wickets fell. The announcements of “One run to China” and “boundary for team China” were loud and clear. Somehow the cheers went off inexplicably after the 10th over when China was 54-3. “Probably the crowd has gone confused like me,” said one of the ever smiling volunteers, who did not want to be named.