While US vice-president Joe Biden hobnobbed with Chinese officials Thursday night in Beijing, an international "basketball friendship match" between the Georgetown Hoyas and Shanghai Bayi Rockets erupted into a violent and embarrassing brawl that threatened to mar the entire vice-presidential visit. Hopes for a resurrection of the "ping-pong diplomacy" that helped re-establish relations between the US and China in the 1970s were dashed as members of both teams threw punches at one another, chairs were thrown, and Chinese spectators hurled water bottles at Georgetown players leaving the court with nine-and-a-half minutes left in the game and the score tied at 64-64.

The fracas on the basketball court was almost certainly followed by a storm of expletives before the television set in the vice-presidential hotel suite, where I would love to have been a fly on the wall. Up to this point, the tone of Biden's visit had been overwhelmingly positive, except for a minor kerfluffle between American reporters and Chinese officials when the reporters were pushed from a Beijing ceremonial hall while the vice-president was still speaking. Following the ill-fated "friendship match" members of the Chinese and American basketball teams reportedly shook hands and made up at the Beijing airport. From Beijing the Hoyas flew on to Shanghai to compete with the Liaoning Dinosaurs at the Nike Sports Festival, where it is hoped that no further violence will ensue.

See also China Daily, The Hoya, Los Angeles Times, Time, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Xinhua. Photo: Reuters.