Yearender: Top 10 Chinese sports news events in 2022

BEIJING, Dec. 27 (Xinhua) -- Here is Xinhua News Agency's selection of the 10 most significant pieces of Chinese sports news in 2022, in chronological order:

- Beijing successfully hosted the Olympic Winter Games from February 4 to 20 and the Paralympic Winter Games from March 4 to 13. Chinese President Xi Jinping attended the opening and closing ceremonies and declared both events open.

China notched nine gold, four silver and two bronze medals to rank third, with the number of gold and total medals marking record highs in its Olympic Winter Games history. Sitting atop the medal standings with 61 medals, of which 18 were golds, the host nation also set new records in its Paralympic Winter Games history.

The legacy of Beijing 2022 went far beyond the arena. When Beijing won the Olympic bid in 2015, China aimed to engage 300 million people in winter sports. And by October 2021, over 346 million Chinese people had participated in winter sports or related leisure activities since 2015, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

- On February 6, China beat South Korea in the AFC Women's Asian Cup final, bringing home its ninth trophy of the tournament after a 16-year wait. The Steel Roses' journey to glory was nearly perfect, scoring 11 goals and conceding zero in the group stage.

- A guideline on building a higher-level public service system for fitness and physical activities was released in March. China also released plans to promote high-quality development of farmers' sports, after-school sports service, women's football as well as outdoor sports industry in 2022.

- China's bronze medal in the men's 4x100 meters relay at last year's Tokyo Olympics was officially recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in May after Britain was stripped of the silver over a doping violation. The Chinese quartet of Su Bingtian, Xie Zhenye, Wu Zhiqiang and Tang Xingqiang posted a time of 37.79 seconds to finish behind Italy, Britain and Canada in Tokyo. But the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled on February 18 that Britain's first-leg runner, Chijindu Ujah, had violated anti-doping regulations. This resulted in the upgrade of Canada and China to silver and bronze medals, respectively.

- 2022 marked a fruitful year for Chinese tennis. In May, Zheng Qinwen reached the round of 16 in her maiden French Open main draw appearance. In August's US Open, qualifier Wu Yibing became the first Chinese mainland player to reach the men's singles third round of any Grand Slam event in the Open Era. In October, Zhang Zhizhen became the first male player from the Chinese mainland to break into the top 100 in the ATP live rankings.

- In June, the Workplan for the China Youth Football League (CYFL) (2022-2024) was released by the Ministry of Education, the State General Administration of Sport and the Chinese Football Association. From July 10 to late November, a total of 1,443 games were played during the inaugural CYFL, involving nearly 10,000 players from 405 teams across the country, marking vital progress in the integration of sports and education in China.

- A revision to China's sports law was passed on June 24 at the session of the National People's Congress Standing Committee and will take effect on January 1, 2023. This was the first comprehensive and systematic revision since the law's initial enforcement in 1995.

The revised Law on Physical Culture and Sports added four new chapters, namely "Anti-Doping", "Sports Arbitration", "Sports Industry" and "Supervision and Management", further improving the basic legal framework of sports in China.

- China won all eight matches to claim its fifth consecutive women's team title at the 2022 ITTF World Team Table Tennis Championships held in Chengdu, China from September 30 to October 9. Meanwhile, the Chinese men's team swept Germany 3-0 to lift the trophy for the 10th time in a row.

- China battled past Olympic bronze medalists France and hosts Australia en route to reaching the final of the women's basketball World Cup for the first time in 28 years. China lost to the United States 83-61 in the final, but the silver medal for China's women represented the nation's best finish in the global showpiece since 1994.

- China will launch extensive public fitness initiatives, improve physical education for the youth, promote all-round development of recreational and competitive sports, and move faster to build China into a country strong in sports, according to the report delivered to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China held in Beijing from October 16 to 22.