Chinese badminton rises back from shame to glory

From match-throwing allegations to a historic clean sweep of all five gold medals, the Chinese badminton team started its journey at the London Olympics at an incredible low, but finished on an unprecedented high.

Since its women's doubles world No 1 pair Yu Yang and Wang Xiaoli were disqualified from the competition with another six female players on charges of "not using one's best efforts to win a match", the under-pressure squad had to give the game its best.

And it contributed some of the most entertaining performances in the remaining stage, including Lin Dan's epic victory over Lee Chong Wei in the men's singles on Sunday.

And they hope their efforts can save some face and repair the sport's image.

"The sport has suffered some negative things in the past few days, and I hope I can change people's attitude about Chinese players and badminton through my fierce game against Lee Chong Wei," Lin said after the men's final.

"I hope the sport will enjoy better and sustained development, which is more important."

China's badminton chief Liu Fengyan hailed the team's athletes for overcoming the pressure brought by the scandal.

"What happened in the women's doubles didn't affect us," Liu said.

"We helped our players consolidate their faith in victory after the two players' disqualification, and we finally got the championships. Our accomplishments come from the overall improvement of Chinese players and young athletes' solid reservation. China's badminton team is a fighting team, and its success is not occasional."

The unexpected nationwide support for the disqualified may have also contributed to China's success. Most Chinese fan believed it was reasonable to make "good" use of the rule, saying the athletes shouldn't shoulder all of the blame.

"I feel the players have been wronged," Chinese fan Cai Murong said.

"There's nothing wrong with making proper use of the games rules. They have prepared for the Olympics for four years, but what they got was the disqualification. World No 1 Yu Yang also retired. To support the athletes, I would rather refuse to watch the game."

Celebrities also joined the discussion, especially after CCTV commentator Bai Yansong said in a nationally televised live program from London that the players were victims of the Olympic badminton competitions' inappropriate rules.

"When everyone is blaming the players for not playing their best, is there anybody thinking about why they made such a choice?" Bai said.

"It's a result of the unreasonable substitution of group games. Players can benefit from losses. Such rules must be abolished."

Even retired basketball star Yao Ming was dragged into the debate. But he believed players should always go all out in the athletic arena.

"Such things have also happened in basketball," he said.

"We should ask ourselves, in our hearts, whether it's right or wrong. Sports can reflect our society's values. If a gold medal is more important than our values, I can only say our values are lower than the medal. I just feel true pity for the players.

"I only represent one kind of attitude. People watch matches with different purposes - some expect fair play, while others may expect their national teams to achieve good results. We should accept different opinions.

"Some events do have flawed rules. And we should allow others to question unreasonable principles."

tangzhe@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 08/07/2012 page10)