The 2019-2020 Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) season ended with the 10th title for Guangdong Southern Tigers last Saturday. 

The past season turned out to be the longest in the league's 25-year history and the organization's president Yao Ming has been full of praise for everybody involved in the campaign who made it happen despite the pandemic.

In an interview with China Media Group, Yao spoke highly of the efforts made to finish the season in a bubble. "The league's season came to an end successfully, thanks to the support and efforts from all people involved, we cannot do it ourselves."

The league was suspended for 132 days, and many overseas players were absent because of the travel restrictions, which somehow affected the games. Yet, as the first domestic major sports event to resume in China, the restart and conclusion of CBA were symbolic. "To be honest, even if the league has ended, I am not feeling relaxed, as there are still lots of work to do. We need to sum up the experiences and learn how to promote the basketball in a new normal way under current circumstances," said Yao.

"I believe our fans have enjoyed the players' spectacular performance on screen, yet our staff performed even better behind the scenes,"Yao added. 

"Our goal is to bring the match back to the teams' home court, and bring the audiences back to the stadiums. To achieve that we need to make detailed protocols that live up to our country's epidemic regulations," Yao said. 

CBA allowed a limited number of audiences with health certificates of being tested negative for COVID-19 into the stadium during the playoffs.

"We are trying hard to make the league a better product, good enough to attract more consumers. We need to learn how to build stronger connection with the audience, making full use of new technology to provide fans with a better viewing experience," said Yao. 

"To upgrade the league is not just designing new logos, it's more about internal culture connotations of the whole league," Yao said.

(Cover image: Yao Ming during the first game of CBA finals series in Qingdao, China, August 11, 2020. /VCG)