In a surprise move, two young, fresh faces appeared on China's most watched news programme on Monday evening and instantly won wide acclaim.

Kang Hui, in his 30s, and Li Zimeng, in her late 20s, hosted the 7 pm daily news programme on CCTV Channel 1.

"Li's youth and vigour, instead of the staid tradition the 7 o'clock news represents, are welcome," the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper said yesterday.

The 30-minute programme (called "Xinwen Lianbo" in Chinese), reaches about 160 million viewers across the country. Three pairs of anchors take turns to host the programme, but Xing Zhibin, a 59-year-old anchorwoman, and Luo Jing, in his 40s, dominate the programme most of the time.

The paper said that CCTV wanted to test viewer reaction to new faces by putting them on air without prior announcement, but the television giant said it was "no big deal."

"We did not expect that it would attract so much media attention," said an executive with CCTV's news centre, who did not want to be named.

It was a routine move, Liang Xiaotao, deputy director of the centre, was quoted as saying by Beijing Morning Post.

Liang added that the station would not replace all the old faces; and that the young anchors were just additions to the team.

"It is necessary to have new blood because audience tastes change with time," said Fu Cheng, dean of the broadcasting department at Communication University of China.

"The monotonous, dull style of the past should be changed. Viewers now prefer anchors with appeal," said Fu.

The CCTV news anchors' appearance and reading style are considered extremely formal. Their hairstyle, dress, expressions, tones, punctuation and volume are strictly defined to ensure authoritative and solemn delivery of information.

The new anchors' clearly-different style struck a chord with audiences: More than 68 per cent of 31,000 netizens surveyed online by China's largest news portal, sina.com.cn, said they liked what they saw.

"If Li Zimeng hosts the programme, I will watch TV every evening," said one.

A "facelift" for the programme was a hot topic earlier this year, when Ye Minghong, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference the nation's top advisory body submitted a motion in March.

Ye suggested that CCTV try new blood for the 7 pm news programme, because the current anchors were "stone-faced" and "dull."

But not all people agreed with Ye.

About 27 per cent of netizens in the survey said new faces do not make a difference because the programme itself has not changed.

Another 3 per cent said they prefer the style of Xing and Luo.

Some media have suggested that Xing Zhibin who read the news last night and is the oldest anchor is going to retire next year, which is why a new anchorwoman was brought in.

Source: China Daily