双语新闻：2024年沙特阿拉伯对体育的参与可能会增加

At the beginning of 2023, Saudi Arabia's growing influence on professional golf, and sports in general, was a concern for players and their fans.

2023年初，沙特阿拉伯对职业高尔夫和整个体育运动的影响力越来越大，这引起了球员和球迷的关注。

Twelve months later, discussions are very different. Worries about the supposed threat of "sportswashing" - using sports to improve a country's reputation – have declined. Concerns about moral issues - the line between "right" and "wrong" - have also gone down. Attention now is fixed on just how rich the Saudis might make the athletes.

12个月后，讨论变得非常不同。对所谓的“体育洗白”(利用体育来提高一个国家声誉)威胁的担忧已经减少。对道德问题的关注——“对”与“错”之间的界限——也有所下降。现在的注意力集中在沙特能让这些运动员赚多少钱上。

What has changed?

发生了什么变化?

Two major events caused the change. On June 6, the PGA Tour announced it was looking to go into business with the Saudi group that was paying for the kingdom's LIV Golf, which the tour had labeled as a threat.

两大事件导致了这一变化。6月6日，美国职业高尔夫球巡回赛宣布，它正在寻求与沙特集团合作，该集团正在为沙特王国的LIV Golf支付费用。美巡赛曾将LIV Golf视为一种威胁。

Then, six months later, Jon Rahm, the world's third-ranked professional golfer and an early resister of LIV, decided to join LIV for a deal reported to be worth about $500 million.

六个月后，世界排名第三的职业高尔夫球手、LIV的早期抵制者乔恩·拉姆决定加入LIV，据报道，他的交易价值约为5亿美元。

Other important events included the continuing talks between the Saudis and leaders of professional tennis organizations. In addition, the push into soccer will bring the world's biggest sporting event, the World Cup, to Saudi Arabia in 2034.

其他重要活动包括沙特与职业网球组织领导人之间的持续会谈。此外，进军足球将使2034年世界最大的体育赛事世界杯在沙特阿拉伯举行。

Dan Durbin is director of the Institute of Sports, Media and Society at the University of Southern California (USC). Durbin said of the Saudi plans: "You're investing in sports, which is one of the few growth industries in the world....It is, as far as we can see, an almost endless growth industry."

丹·德宾是南加州大学体育、媒体与社会研究所所长。德宾谈到沙特的计划时说:“你在投资体育，这是世界上为数不多的增长型产业之一....在我们看来，这是一个几乎永无止境的增长行业。”

Saudi's investments

沙特的投资

In early 2022, the discussion about golf centered on Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, or PIF, in LIV Golf. At the time, six-time major winner Phil Mickelson made a critical comment about Saudi Arabia related to the murder of the Washington Post writer Jamal Khashoggi.

2022年初，关于高尔夫的讨论集中在沙特阿拉伯的公共投资基金(Public Investment Fund，简称PIF)在LIV golf的投资上。当时，六次大满贯得主菲尔·米克尔森就《华盛顿邮报》作家贾马尔·卡舒吉被谋杀一事对沙特阿拉伯发表了批评言论。

Mickelson's comment set the dividing line in what was viewed as a moral question. And the discussion ignored how important Saudi Arabia is in the world economy. The Saudis gain much of their importance by supplying around 15 percent of the world's petroleum.

米克尔森的评论在这个被视为道德问题的问题上划清了界限。讨论忽略了沙特阿拉伯在世界经济中的重要性。沙特阿拉伯的石油供应量占全球的15%左右，这在很大程度上提高了其重要性。

Besides golf, the fund offered one of soccer's biggest stars, Cristiano Ronaldo, $200 million to join a Saudi team. And it also owns the Premier League's Newcastle soccer club.

除了高尔夫，该基金还向足球巨星之一克里斯蒂亚诺·罗纳尔多提供了2亿美元，邀请他加入一支沙特球队。它还拥有英超联赛的纽卡斯尔足球俱乐部。

As the calendar turns to 2024, there is no sign of Saudi involvement in sports slowing. The Saudis are hosting a Formula One auto race. They are also looking to invest some $5 billion into cricket's Indian Premier League with an eye on making it bigger in other countries.

随着日历转到2024年，没有迹象表明沙特参与体育活动的速度放缓。沙特正在举办一级方程式赛车比赛。他们还打算向印度板球超级联赛投资约50亿美元，着眼于在其他国家扩大板球联赛的规模。

The ATP, which runs men's professional tennis, has a five-year deal to hold one of its biggest events in the Saudi port city of Jeddah. Talks between the Saudis and the women's tour are reportedly ongoing.

管理男子职业网球的ATP签订了一项为期五年的协议，将在沙特港口城市吉达举办其最大的赛事之一。据报道，沙特与这两名女子的谈判正在进行中。

In a sign of how public discussions have changed, Billie Jean King, who fought for equal pay for women in sports, has said bringing women's tennis to the kingdom might not be all bad despite its poor record on women's rights.

在体育运动中争取女性同工同酬的比利·简·金表示，尽管在女性权利方面的记录不佳，但将女子网球引入王国可能并不全是坏事，这表明公众讨论发生了怎样的变化。

"I don't think you really change unless you engage," she said earlier this year.

她在今年早些时候说:“我认为，除非你参与进来，否则你不会真正改变。”

Durbin says sports is a way for the kingdom to be seen as more than an oil-producer with a bad human-rights record.

德宾说，体育是让沙特不再被视为一个人权记录糟糕的石油生产国的一种方式。

"For decades, sports has been the center of soft diplomacy," he said. "You try to create a positive response and feeling about your ethics because you're holding to the rules of sports."

“几十年来，体育一直是软外交的中心，”他说。“你试图创造一种积极的回应，让人们对你的道德有一种感觉，因为你在坚持体育规则。”