Indonesia bans pair after Olympic scandal

JAKARTA - Agence France-Presse

Indonesia’s Greysia Polii and Meiliana Jauhari play against South Africa’s Michelle Edwards and Annari Viljoen during their women’s doubles competition in London.

The Indonesian badminton association banned its women’s doubles pair from competitions for four months after they were disqualified for throwing a match in the Olympics, an official said yesterday.

Greysia Polii and her partner Meiliana Jauhari are “ineligible for national and international competition for four months until Dec. 3”, the Indonesian Badminton Association secretary-general Yacob Rusdianto told the Agence France-Presse.

The Badminton World Federation (BWF) disqualified the pair at the beginning of August after they tried to lose matches in the first round group phase in an attempt to manipulate the knockout draw. They were banned from competitions immediately after disqualification.

“We made the decision after conducting internal investigations and finding they had violated the rule of fair play in the Olympics,” Rusdianto said.

Two South Korean pairs and one Chinese pair were also disqualified for the offence of “not using one’s best efforts to win a match.”

The scandal prompted Chinese badminton star Yu Yang to quit the sport. Rusdianto called for Olympic organizers to review the format of the badminton competition.

“We are not protesting, but merely calling for the BWF to re-look at the competition format so that players will not repeat the mistake in future matches,” he said.