Cheered on by the Taiwanese people, the national team finally beat its long-time rival South Korea 5-4 after a 10-inning game in the Asian Baseball Championship in Sapporo, Japan. This victory, and another over China, meant Taiwan qualified for next year's Olympic Games in Athens.
The success came after years of failure. Taiwan's baseball team failed to qualify for the previous three Olympics after winning a silver medal at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona.
After beating South Korea and qualifying for the Olympics, what we should consider now is how to win at the Olympics. After all, the competition at the Olympics is much more serious than it was in the Asian Baseball Championship. In addition, the development of baseball should be sustainable, not just a flash in the pan.
Therefore, building Taiwan into a respected baseball power is of concern to all fans. There are a number of ways to achieve this.
The first is making use of technology integration. Although player performance is crucial to the result of a game, what's more important is to let players play to the best of their ability. Hence, backup support is particularly important, including support from information technology, treatment of injuries, sport science, psychological counselling and an understanding of international affairs.
Thus, only by integrating technologies from diversified fields can our national baseball team play to its full strength. Baseball is not a sport that merely stresses players' skills or tactics.
Next is the issue of upgrading the industry. In recent years, one of the trends in international sport has been "professionalization." The Olympics has also lifted its restrictions on professional players in baseball, basketball and tennis. The core of professionalization lies in "professionalism."
Apart from emphasizing players' professionalism during this process, we should also professionalize a number of peripheral matters.
These include judging, reporting in the media, the management of stadiums and sports organizations and even the performance of our fans, whose "professional" performance during the Taiwan-South Korea game forced the South Korean media to admit to their inferiority.
In other words, Taiwanese baseball must be operated as a business, professionally and scientifically, because people's passion may be unable to support the sport for too much longer.
The driving force in upgrading the baseball industry will come from two very human aspects: the quality of our athletes and the ability of those who are responsible for building and selling the sport.
Last, as the old saying goes, "Harmony in the family is the basis for any undertaking."(
As a result, Taiwanese baseball disappeared from the international stage for quite some time.
The Athens Olympics are approaching, and Taiwan is expected to regain its position as one of the world's top five baseball powers.
How to consolidate the strengths of each aspect of the nation's baseball industry should now be the main concern for the authorities.
After all, winning an Olympic gold medal will no longer be a dream if we can unite with one heart.
Kevin Huang Yu is an associate professor in the department of sport management at National Taiwan College of Physical Education.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations