The Home Crowd

I might have witnessed the greatest display of patriotism ever tonight. Qualifying by default of being the host country, the Chinese men’s volleyball team played their second match of the 2008 Olympic Games. China has not qualified for the Olympics in twenty-four years and the men’s team has not enjoyed much success in recent years. Almost always overshadowed by the dominant women’s team, one that took home the gold medal in the 2004 Athens games, the Chinese men are relatively unknown to most mainland Chinese, let alone the international community.

Their relative obscurity did not diminish the amount of support they received one bit. The stadium was packed to the brim with the 18,000 seat stadium filled with almost entirely of Chinese fans expressing their unrelenting support. The noise, the energy and the emotion was unparallel to anything I’ve ever been a part of. The Chinese team was facing a young Venezuelan squad which included a lot of talent, but not nearly enough experience to make a serious push for the quarter finals. As one of the few teams that the Chinese had a decent shot of beating, the anticipation and expectation was oozing through the crowd. Every point won by the Chinese resulted in a thunderous cheer and every Venezuelan serve was greeted by a chorus of booing. The match definitely lived up to anyone’s wildest expectations as it was only decided by the fifth set tiebreaker. The entire Capital Stadium was rocking when the home team prevailed 16 to 14.

As a supposedly unbiased member of the media, I even couldn’t help but to cheer.