Chinese TV cuts maskless World Cup scenes as Covid anger mounts
- State broadcaster cuts to shots of coaches rather than show fans without masks in Qatar
- The country is the last major economy still attempting to stamp out the domestic spread of Covid-19
China’s state broadcaster is cutting close-up shots of maskless fans at the Qatar World Cup, after early coverage sparked anger at home where street protests have erupted over harsh Covid-19 restrictions.
The country is the last major economy still attempting to stamp out the domestic spread of Covid-19 with snap lockdowns, lengthy quarantines and mass testing campaigns.
During a live broadcast of Sunday’s group game between Japan and Costa Rica, state broadcaster CCTV Sports replaced close-up shots of maskless fans waving flags with images of players, officials or the football stadium.
Broadcasters had already taken action to cut out crowd shots, doing exactly the same for the game between Australia and Tunisia, a move that was quickly picked up by social media.
CCTV Sports showed distant shots of the crowd where it was difficult to make out individual faces, and fewer crowd shots compared to the live telecast of the same game on online platforms including Douyin -- China’s version of TikTok.