Former Chinese badminton champion Ye Zhaoying claims she was forced to deliberately lose at the 2000 Sydney Olympics to increase the chances of a gold medal for one of her compatriots in an interview broadcast on Saturday by Danish television TV2.
Twenty-two years later, the former world number one, bronze medalist in Australia, says she was pushed by her management to lose her semi-final against Gong Zhichao in order not to “tire her too much” in preparation for the final. against Danish champion Camilla Martin.
“They told me before the match that it shouldn’t be too obvious. I shouldn’t tire Gong Zhichao either, I had to lose in two sets,” explains the player, who now lives in exile in Spain. “If you watch the match again, I play at the beginning, but then I start to deliberately put the shuttlecock out or into the net,” she explains in this interview with TV2.
The former player, in her accusations of match-fixing in the middle of the Olympic Games, does not say precisely who in the Chinese management asked her to lose.
“We feel very powerless, because we are alone against the system. The Olympics are almost a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for an athlete, so it’s really sad. But as an individual, I couldn’t oppose the system,” she says.
Gong Zhichao, considered better placed to win gold, actually won the final by dominating Camilla Martin.
In a statement, the Badminton World Federation said it took “accusations of this nature” very seriously.
“If the federation cannot comment on specific details linked to this historic incident, no fixed match of any kind is tolerated in badminton,” said its president, the Dane Thomas Lund, assuring that he wanted to “protect the “integrity of this sport” by “very firm” measures against any arrangement.
The interview with the Chinese player was conducted in Malaga, Spain, where Ye Zhaoying lives in exile with her husband, former Chinese soccer star Hao Haidong.
The couple explains to TV2 that they have almost no hope of one day returning to China since the strong criticism leveled in June 2020 by the former footballer against the Chinese authorities.
2022-08-27 07:00:00
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