After the Olympics, sports fever continues in Shanghai

The Olympics have ended, but sports fever in Shanghai is continuing with Chinese and American university students exchanges.

On Thursday, the 2024 China-US University Tennis Friendship Tournament kicked off at the Qizhong Tennis Center, venue for the annual Rolex Shanghai Masters, with more than 20 students and coaches from the two countries.

The students are from famous American higher-education institutions, such as Dartmouth College and Boston University, and prestigious Chinese colleges including East China University of Science and Technology and Zhejiang University.

The event, including group and individual competitions, is hosted by East China University of Science and Technology and Shanghai Juss Sports Development Group and aims to promote Sino-US exchanges and cooperation. Besides competitions, the American students and teachers will visit local landmarks and take part in cultural experiences to develop their knowledge on China.

It's also part of the city's efforts to implement the initiative raised by Chinese President Xi Jinping to invite 50,000 American students to China to enhance exchanges between the two countries.

Shen Haitao, deputy Party chief of East China University of Science and Technology, said he wished that via sports, a common language of the world, students will build a bridge of friendship, have a deeper understanding of each other, inject new impetus into the long-term development of bilateral relations, and work together to create a better world.

The American students and coaches said they were impressed by the performance of Chinese tennis players at the Paris Olympics, such as Zheng Qinwen and Zhang Zhizhen, the women's singles gold medal winner and a silver medal winner in mixed doubles, respectively, and were looking forward to competing with their Chinese peers.

Some of them are on their first visit to China.

"I decided to take part in these competitions because I've never been to China," said Sophia Wax from Tufts University. "And I love to play tennis and I think it's so great that there's an opportunity for us to share our love for this sport with people from all the world."

She said though her grandmother was from Shanghai, she had never come to the city before and was "super excited to just explore around the city to try new things and experience the culture."

Michael James Sowter, a coach at Fordham University, said the event was a new experience for him and a lot of the players.

"I've had three players from China on my team at Fordham before, so it's an exciting opportunity to come over here and experience some of the Chinese culture. We're having a really nice time," he said. "I would be more than happy to come back and do it every year."

It's the second visit to China for Johnny Elias Bo Haase from Stevens Institute of Technology. He said, besides a love for tennis since the age of five or six, he saw this event a good opportunity to learn more about China and make new friends.

Matthew Benjamin Kandel from Williams College, majoring in Chinese and mathematics, said he had visited Taiwan to learn Chinese but this was his first time on the Chinese mainland.

"It's my first time in Shanghai, I've heard it's one of the most modern cities in China, so I'm looking forward to exploring the city," he said.

"I also would like to try local food. I heard Shanghai cuisine is sweet, I will try it. But I also like spicy food."

Meanwhile, two basketball competitions took place at Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Fok Ying Tung Sports Center on Friday – one between men's teams from SJTU and New York University and the other between women's teams from both universities.

The stadium was filled with shouting and cheers on Friday evening during the Buick 2024 Campus Invitational.

It was the first of its kind organized by Great Sports and ESPN and the two sides hope to build it into a long-standing brand for exchanges between China and the rest of the world.