Chinese sports couple Ye Zhaoying and Hao Haidong were removed from the country’s record books after they denounced the Chinese Communist Party and voiced plans to overthrow the government, South China Morning Post reports.
Ye is a two-time women’s singles world champion and also won the bronze medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. Her husband Hao is a former international football player.
Their Weibo (social media) accounts have reportedly been deleted. The two major sports news portals in China, Sina Sports and Tencent Sports, no longer show any results of their names in their search engines.
Ye Zhaoying was a bold character during her badminton years. After winning the women’s singles bronze medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, she was engulfed in a controversy when she pointed fingers at Li Yongbo. She said that her defeat to fellow Chinese player Gong Zhichao in the semifinals was arranged by head coach Li. According to Ye, this was because Gong had a better record against the opponent in the final, Camilla Martin from Denmark. Ye felt she had no choice but to follow the orders even though she was furious with the plan.
The couple is believed to be residing in Spain now.