‘Japanese Doll’ Ai Fukuhara breaks China’s heart with retirement from table tennis

Table tennis icon Ai Fukuhara, known to her millions of fans in China as the “Japanese Doll”, announced her retirement on Sunday, causing an outpouring of affection on Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter.

Unusually for a Japanese player, Fukuhara has more than 3.9 million social media followers in China who adore her because of her deep ties to the country.