The Badminton World Federation disqualified eight badminton players after charging them with trying to throw their matches, in order to manipulate the draw.

In an announcement on Wednesday, the BWF said they had decided to send the players out of the tournament of the London Olympics.

"Four pairs who contested women's doubles matches in the London 2012 Olympics last evening (Tuesday 31 July) at Wembley Arena have been disqualified by the Badminton World Federation (BWF)," a statement read.

"After a hearing this morning before the BWF's Disciplinary Committee the following pairs were disqualified: Wang Xiaoli and Yu Yang (China); Greysia Polii and Meiliana Jauhari (Indonesia); Jung Kyung-Eun and Kim Ha-Na (Korea); and Ha Jung-Eun and Kim Min-Jung (Korea).

"The Indonesian and Korean pairs have appealed the decision. The pairs were charged under BWF's Players' Code of Conduct - Sections 4.5 and 4.16 respectively - with "not using one's best efforts to win a match" and "conducting oneself in a manner that is clearly abusive or detrimental to the sport".

"The appeal process is ongoing and a final decision pending."

Earlier on Tuesday, the governing charged four pairs of female Olympic doubles players, two from South Korea, one from China and one from Indonesia, for "not using one's best efforts to win a match".

In an apparent ruse to manipulate the draw, the players kept hitting the shuttle wide or serving into the net.

At the Wembley Arena, fans booed the match between the Chinese pair of Yu Yang and Wang Xiaoli and South Koreans Jung Kyung-eun and Kim Ha-na. The longest rally of the first game was just four shots, with rallies generally in the sport easily going into double figures.

The match referee Thorsten Berg, at one point, was forced to come onto the court and warn both sets of players. South Korea won the match 21-14, 21-11, with both teams already qualifying for the quarter-finals.

If the Chinese pair, seeded one, had won the match, they would have met their compatriots Tian Quing and Zhao Yunlei before the final; however, with the loss, rather conveniently, they ensured they can only meet each other in the gold-medal round.

"The Chinese started this," an infuriated Korea coach Sung Han-kook said. "They did it first. It's a complicated thing with the draws. They didn't want to meet each other in the semi-final; they don't want that to happen.

"They (BWF) should do something about that."

Yu, however, defended her team's tactics, saying they were just preserving energy for the knockout rounds. "Actually these opponents really were strong," the Chinese insisted. "This is the first time we've played them and tomorrow it's the knockout rounds, so we've already qualified and we wanted to have more energy for the knockout rounds."

If everyone thought the drama was over, they were in for a surprise when similar scenes arose at a later match between South Korean third seeds Ha Jung-Eun and Kim Min-Jung and Indonesian pair Meiliana Juahari and Greysia Polii, both of whom, of course, had already qualified for the knockout stages.

Referee Berg, clearly shocked by the events, again had to step out on court, and even brandished a black card, which signals disqualification. However, after the Indonesian players protested, the match was resumed.

The Ha and Kim Min-Jung won the match in three games, but refused to make any comment, before walking off the court.

"I don't know what happened," Polii told reporters. "If that's the game, we have to accept all the things.

"Either they want to trust us -- we play bad or we play good. Our control is only to play as good as we can."

The State-run Xinhua News Agency in China cited an unnamed spokesman for the Chinese delegation in London as saying the team was taking the incident seriously.

"The Chinese delegation will handle this case according to the results of the investigation into this match," the spokesman said.

Bulgarian badminton player Petya Nedelcheva said China were the ones who controlled the sport. "China control everything," she said. "I don't know who controlled the match to lose but if it is China again, they did it so many times last year, they didn't play against each other in 20 matches. They do what they want."

Former Great Britain silver medallist Gail Emms said the potential for fixing was raised earlier, but was ignored. "All the managers got together with the referee and said: 'Look, this has happened; in Group D you will find some very dodgy matches going on in the evening because of it' and the referee laughed and said: 'Oh don't be silly,'" she said. "And the managers said: 'We know the game, we know the players and we know the teams and we know this is going to happen.'"

"Badminton, in the Olympics and in all tournaments across the circuit, it's never played in a group stage, it's always a straight knockout system and for some reason they decided that the Olympic Games in 2012 should be this group stages.

"And as soon as I heard that I went: 'It's going to bring up match-fixing,' that was my first thought, and lo and behold last night that is exactly what happened."