Two-time Olympic gold medallist and defending Finals champion Viktor Axelsen has announced his withdrawal from the HSBC BWF World Tour Finals 2024 due to injury. The vacant spot has been accepted by China’s Li Shi Feng, who was No.8 on the HSBC Race To Finals Rankings. Li won the Kumamoto Masters Japan 2024 last month to surge in the rankings.

Axelsen, who automatically qualified to the season finale after winning gold at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, announced the decision on social media.

“I’m unfortunately unable to participate in the HSBC BWF World Tour Finals this December. I’m dealing with an injury in my left foot, which is causing me a lot of issues and I have been advised to deal with this immediately in order to avoid long term problems.

“I’m very disappointed not being able to play in Hangzhou. Having won the tournament five times and it being one of my favorite tournaments on the tour makes it a hard pill to swallow.”

After claiming gold in Paris, Axelsen won the LI-NING Hong Kong Open 2024 and was semifinalist at the Kumamoto Masters Japan 2024 and LI-NING China Masters 2024.

Of the Dane’s five season finale titles, two were achieved at the Dubai World Superseries Finals (2016, 2017), while the next three were back-to-back titles in Bali, Bangkok and Hangzhou (2021, 2022, 2023) on the HSBC BWF World Tour.

The group stage draw for this year’s Hangzhou Finals will be conducted on 7 December at 11am local time.