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November 18, 2016

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Home » Sports » Badminton

Lin admits affair, says ‘sorry’ to his family

BADMINTON super star Lin Dan has apologized after a paparazzi post claiming he was having an affair while his wife was pregnant set the Chinese Internet abuzz.

“As a man, I shall seek no excuses to defend myself. My behavior anyway has hurt the feelings of my family and I hereby apologize to my family. Sorry!” Lin said in his post on Weibo at about 2pm yesterday, hours after claims of the scandal swept Chinese social networking platforms.

The frenzy began yesterday after a widely-followed Weibo user posted photos and videos of Lin with a “mystery woman”. The post came just days after Lin’s wife, Xie Xingfang, also a badminton star, gave birth to their first child — a son — on November 5.

“Detective Zhao”, a popular Weibo author famous for gossiping about celebrities and entertainment stars, posted pictures and videos he claimed showed the two-time Olympic champion with a woman in October.

Other internet users quickly identified her as Zhao Yaqi, a model and actress.

The post spread like wildfire online and drew tens of thousands of comments on Weibo and other platforms.

National team coach Li Yongbo, in Fuzhou for the China Open, said Lin was still on leave and he didn’t know anything about the story until he saw it in the news.

Lin, 33, is one of China’s biggest sports stars, having won the world championships five times.

He won the “super grand slam” of all nine of the sport’s major titles by the age of 28, and was the first player ever to retain Olympic gold when he followed up his Beijing 2008 win with the title at London 2012. He is also a six-time All England champion and is widely regarded as the greatest singles player of all time.




 

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