Cardboard soccer fans at Ceres Park stadium in Aarhus, Denmark. During a match on Thursday, screens showed live feeds from fans’ homes.Credit…Henning Baggervia/Ritzau Scanpix, via Reuters
It looked like any other Zoom meeting of the coronavirus era: blurry images of people on couches, and many shots so wide that they included more ceiling and wall than people.
But as Denmark’s top soccer league kicked off again on Thursday after an 80-day hiatus, those video feeds were part of a 40-meter-long “virtual grandstand” of spectators.
The screens at Ceres Park stadium displayed a changing selection of 10,000 live feeds from spectators’ homes. As the home team, AGF Aarhus, struggled against Randers — saving face with a last-minute equalizer that ended the match in a 1-1 tie — the fans’ faces alternated between joy and despair.
Mads Wessberg, an AGF supporter who was among the faces in the virtual grandstand, wore the team’s white jersey. Speaking with a local television station from his couch, beer in hand, he said he appreciated the invitation to see the game, but missed the rush he normally got from being in the stadium.
Ever since Denmark began a gradual reopening in mid-April, the rates of hospital admissions and Covid-19 deaths have been in steady decline. But even though shops, restaurants and schools are open again, restrictions are still in place for spectator sports and other large events, and the country’s borders remain closed to most travelers.
To make up for the lack of spectators in its stadium, AGF Aarhus has taken other measures besides the virtual grandstand. It added canned cheers and stadium noises, for example, plus a team of online moderators to filter out obscene gestures.
After Thursday’s match, the team’s coach, David Nielsen, praised the “somewhat alternative 2020 atmosphere.”
