Badminton

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THE eight badminton players at the centre of allegations of throwing matches have been disqualified from the Olympics.

The four women's doubles pairs - two from South Korea, one from Indonesia and one from China - were disqualified following a disciplinary hearing of the Badminton World Federation on Wednesday.

The decision means the Australian pair of Renuga Veeran and Leanne Choo are promoted and get an unexpected lifeline into the quarter-finals after earlier being eliminated.

This followed farcical scenes on the badminton courts at Wembley last night when the Chinese top seeds blatantly failed to try against a Korean pair, who then followed suit.

The apparent attempt to manipulate the draw spread to a second Korean pair playing Indonesia, and caused uproar in the sport's international controlling body.

Australia had dropped out of the competition after being beaten on Monday.