(Source: China Daily)Nov.1 - Those who tried for hours on Tuesday to get Olympic Games tickets only to see selling suspended will be served first when the booking service resumes.

The director of the Games’ ticketing center, Rong Jun, said at a press conference Wednesday that the organizers will give priority to those who left their contact information after waiting outside Bank of China outlets or on the phone.

More details will be announced next Monday together with new ticketing information.

Sales of the second portion of Games tickets reserved for Chinese citizens were halted on Tuesday after the booking system crashed from the overwhelming demand.

The first-come-first-serve scheme saw 1.85 million tickets on sale through websites, a hotline and designated Bank of China branches. In one hour, 8 million people visited the website. And in the first three hours, 20 million people visited, when there were just 1.85 million tickets available.

Only 43,000 tickets were sold when the service was suspended at 6 pm.

Rong said organizers “underestimated the situation and enthusiasm of people, and did not prepare fully and have a good contingency plan”.

Rong said ticket orders remain valid and those who got the tickets offline will have more time to pay.

Rong said organizers are working with the ticket service providers, a joint venture between the United States firm TicketMaster and two Chinese firms, to upgrade the system.

The Beijing Olympic Games, which will open next August, has 7 million tickets available, with about 75 percent reserved for domestic sale.

Well-known baseball player Cal Ripken teaches Chinese kids how to play baseball at a primary school in Beijing October 30, 2007. It is the first time for Ripken to visit China as an American Public Diplomacy Envoy for the U.S. Department of State. After his tour in Beijing, Ripken will go to Shanghai and Guangzhou to introduce baseball to Chinese new audiences.

(Source: Xinhua)Oct. 31 - The world football governing body, Fifa, announced on Tuesday that Brazil will be the country to host the World Cup in 2014.

“The executive committee has decided unanimously to give the responsibility, not the right, to organize Fifa’s World Cup 2014 to the country Brazil,” said Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, in a statement.

The trophy was handed to visiting Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva at the Fifa headquarters in Zurich on Tuesday.

It is the first time since 1950 that the privilege has been bestowed on the Latin American country that calls itself “the land of the football boot.”

A football World Cup tournament is considered the world’s biggest sports event. Brazil, which have won the Cup a record five times, were the only candidate for the 2014 event.

(Source: Xinhua)BEIJING, Oct. 31 - The sale of the second batch of Olympic tickets was suspended after the booking system collapsed under overwhelming demand on Tuesday, the first day tickets became available.

The Beijing Organizing Committee for the 2008 Olympic Games (BOCOG) said Tuesday night in a statement that they had decided to temporarily halt domestic ticket sales to improve the technical plan and will announce new ticketing information on November 5.

“Because of the overwhelming volume of page visits, the technical system was unable to perform the tasks well enough, and many applicants were unable to successfully submit their applications,” said the BOCOG statement.

“We sincerely apologize to the public,” it added.

The first-come-first-serve scheme had 1.85 million tickets on sale through the booking website, a hotline and designated branches of Bank of China.

But demand was much higher than organizers anticipated: According to the Beijing Olympic Ticketing Center, the official ticketing website (www.tickets.beijing2008.cn) saw 8 million hits in the first hour starting 9 a.m., while the ticketing hotline received 3.8 million calls.

Only some 9,000 tickets were sold in two hours; and the ticketing center confirmed that successful orders will be valid.

A total of 7 million tickets are available for the Games, with about 75 percent reserved for domestic sale. The first 1.6 million tickets were allocated after a lottery earlier this year. The third phase - from April to August next year - will also sell tickets on a first-come-first-serve basis.

Chinanews, Beijing, Oct 30 ¨C People who want to come to Beijing to see the 2008 Olympic Games shouldn’t worry about a shortage of hotel bedspace in Beijing. Information shows that the number of bedspace available during the Olympic Games will be twice the number of audiences coming to Beijing. Everyone will have a room to live in, said Beijing Municipal Tourism Bureau, the Beijing Morning Post reported.

During the 2008 Olympic Games, about 333,000 visitors will come to Beijing. According to the latest publicized figures, by September 2007, there were altogether 5,780 hotels in Beijing and these hotels could provide units of 646,400 beds in total, nearly double the number of the expected audiences. Of these hotels, there were 735 star-graded hotels, which could provide about 200,000 beds. In addition, there were 5,045 small inns which could provide 430,000 beds. Besides these operating hotels and inns, there are about 100 hotels which are being built or graded at present, which, when completed, can provide additional 50,000 beds, said Xiong Yumei, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Tourism Bureau.

With regard to the room price, an issue that many people are concerned with, Xiong said the room price would follow market rules. Since there are sufficient hotel beds, there is no need to worry that hotel price will be set at an extraordinarily high level. Right now, some hotels charge a high price for room reservation for the Olympic Games. In response to this, Xiong said the price was only the initial information that customers got on the phone, but it might go down based on market demand.

¡°It is expected that by the first half of next year, the number of star-graded hotels in Beijing will further rise to 800,¡± Xiong finally noted.

(Source: Xinhua)Oct. 30 - Wei Wei, dubbed “female Yao Ming”, proved a promising player of women’s basketball at the 6th Chinese City Games.

Wei’s attempt to help Guangzhou top the podium failed when beaten by defending champion Nanjing 80-72 on Sunday.

The 18-year-old Wei is 207cm tall, three centimeters taller than Zheng Haixia, who used to be the No.One center of Chinese women’s national basketball team and helped China won the silver medal in 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games.

“Other than Wei Wei, we failed to find any other potential players,” said Gong Luming, former head coach of Chinese women’s national basketball team.

However, Wei’s performance was not that outstanding. She never appeared in the starting line-up of Guangzhou, and her performance was up and down.

“Wei should have become a leading player in national team but she is still too weak in strength and not forceful in the paint.” Gong said.

Wei first entered the national team in 2005 but failed to make a stand.

Wei was born in Taiyuan, provincial city of Shanxi. Her father was 196cm and used to a center of Police team while her mother, 182cm, was once the leading player of Shanxi team.

Wei is deemed to be associated with basketball and the first gift she got from her parents was just a basketball.

“I love basketball ever since I was a child, and I have a lot of basketballs at home,” said Wei.

“Although my parents are basketball players but they didn’t teach me to play basketball on purpose. I just played it with my classmates in the primary school. Only until they realized that I had a deep love for the sport did they begin to teach me.”

When Wei was a 4th Grade student, she was already 185cm tall. A coach from Guangzhou Weilun Sports school noticed her and brought her to the school to receive systematic training.

In October 2001, Wei became a member of Chinese National Juvenile team. In 2003, she entered the national youth team. In 2005, she was recruited into the national team.

However, Wei is only 90 kilograms in weight and weak in strength. These disadvantages dropped her out of the national team list several times like in 2006 she missed the Doha Asian Games.

But as Guangzhou team coach Zheng Wei said: “She is still young and should not take much strength training as she is still growing. We make special training plans for her.”

Zheng limited Wei’s appearance time on the court during the City Games.

“I asked her to play a maximum of twenty minutes in order to protect her. But she had an average of ten points and ten rebounds. The performance is good,” said Zheng.

Wei started to play the WCBA league in 2004. In the debutant match, Wei played five minutes and 32 seconds, scored two points and dished out one rebound.

While in the league after the Doha Asian Games, she averaged 17 points in 36 minutes in one match.

“I think my speed is OK but my techniques are just so-so. I do well in blocks and defense,” Wei said: “What I badly need is to add up my weight. I should be over 100 kg.”

When talking about personal goal, Wei said: “I hope to play in the WNBA league.”

There are so far only three Chinese players who once played in the WNBA league.

Zheng Haixia played for Los Angeles Sparks in 1997 and 1998 while Sui Feifei and Miao Lijie played for Sacramento Monarchs in 2005.

Talking about Wei’s potential, Gong Luming said: “It totally depends on her devotion to the sport, but up to now she has made steady progress.”