China Basketball Association decided to remove two teams from the playoffs because of accusations of match-fixing.
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With heavy punishment meted out, Chinese Basketball Association has flexed its muscles over a recent match-fixing scandal, underlining @YaoMing‘s pledge to fix the sport’s broken image and expanding China’s wider war on corruption in professional sports. #CBA pic.twitter.com/igBMG2Mw4M— China Daily (@ChinaDaily) April 18, 2023
Shanghai Sharks and Jiangsu Dragons were the clubs the league concluded were influencing the result in their playoff series.
CBA announced that these teams displayed a “lack of competitive effort” and were “negative in competition” during their playoff series in best of 3 format.
Sharks and Dragons received an equal of 5 million dollars penalty, and the GM and coaches of these teams were ruled out from the Chinese basketball league for up to five years.
Yao Ming, former NBA star and chief of the China Basketball Association, said on Saturday that he requires details from Shanghai Sharks and Jiangsu Dragons for what happened in their series.
Then on Monday, Ming added that circumstances are “quite saddening” but will need to act with disciplinary actions to keep the league’s credibility.