A superstitious top-tier Chinese team repainted their entire stadium gold to bring better luck following a dismal run — and this week duly celebrated a fifth big home win on the bounce.
Guangzhou R&F last month took the drastic action believing that gold made for better feng shui than blue, the color of the Chinese Super League (CSL) team’s strip, badge and originally its home ground, too.
It followed a rotten sequence of just one home win in four months.
Photo: AFP
However, since painstakingly repainting their 20,000-capacity Yuexiushan Stadium in the middle of last month, the team in southern China have seen their fortunes dramatically reverse.
On Wednesday, they beat Fabio Capello’s big-spending Jiangsu Suning 4-2 at home to climb to third in the CSL and make it four home wins on the trot in the CSL, scoring 18 goals in the process.
They also beat city rivals Guangzhou Evergrande in a home cup game.
“After we changed the color of our home stadium, we got five wins and a high goal-scoring rate as well,” R&F coach Dragan Stojkovic said on the team’s Web site.
“I think this is what the fans want to see — beautiful offensive [soccer],” Stojkovic added.
“The gold color of our home stadium is pretty nice, no need to change it now,” the Serbian former international added.
The philosophy of feng shui — literally meaning “wind water” — is influential in many parts of Asia, where people carefully position items in offices and homes to maximize luck and wealth.
LEGAL ACTION: The Suns said they were among the first teams approved for this season, but they had been asked to meet a stricter financial criterion afterward The Taichung Suns will not play in the T1 League’s 2023-2024 season after repeatedly failing to meet criteria regarding team finances, the professional basketball league said in a statement on Friday. The T1 League said that following the decision on the Suns, made at the league’s 22nd executive council meeting, it would postpone a planned news conference on Wednesday to discuss the upcoming season. A source familiar with the league’s operations told reporters that the Suns had been asked at two previous meetings of the T1 League’s executive council to provide evidence proving the franchise had the requisite finances. The announcement of the
EARLY LOSSES: Some sports have already started at the Asian Games in Hangzhou ahead of the opening ceremony on Saturday, including volleyball, with a Taiwan loss South Korea’s bid for a third straight men’s gold medal in soccer at the Asian Games got off to the perfect start with a 9-0 thrashing of Kuwait on Tuesday, but coach Hwang Sun-hong is giving his players little time to enjoy it. With a more testing group match against Thailand today, Hwang is wary of complacency creeping in after his side ran riot against Kuwait in Jinhua, China, southwest of host city Hangzhou. “We’ll pretend this match never happened,” Hwang said after the Kuwait game, Yonhap news agency reported. “We have even more difficult matches coming up later, and we have
‘NOTHING HAS CHANGED’: Jenni Hermoso said that the striking players had been ‘caught by surprise’ by the call-ups, saying it was a strategy to intimidate them Striking Spanish internationals called up to the women’s team on Monday reiterated their desire not to form part of the squad in a new blow for the shaken the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF). However, they were told by the government early yesterday that those who did not attend the team’s camps when called up would have to be punished. Spanish National Sports Council president Victor Francos said he would have to apply the country’s sports law. “If they don’t turn up, the government would have to apply the law, which is a pity for me, but the law is the
China hopes to make a splash with the Asian Games, which officially open tomorrow, but nationwide excitement has been muted as the economy sputters and some question the cost of the sporting extravaganza. Delayed a year by the COVID-19 pandemic, the quadrennial Games, kicking off in the eastern city of Hangzhou, will be China’s biggest sporting event in more than a decade, with more than 12,000 athletes from 45 nations competing in 40 sports. Organizers this week expressed confidence in holding a “magnificent” Games, thanks to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “important instructions” and great, broad-based efforts. Analysts agree the event would likely