He Zhili (simplified Chinese:何智丽;traditional Chinese:何智麗;pinyin:Hé Zhìlì; born 30 September 1964 inShanghai),[1] also known by her married nameChire Koyama (小山 ちれ,Koyama Chire), is a formertable tennis world champion fromChina[2] who later naturalized as a Japanese citizen and representedJapan under her married name.
Representing China as He Zhili, she was the runner-up in both singles and doubles at theSeoul Games in 1986. Koyama won the1994 Asian Games singles title inHiroshima,Japan playing for her adopted country.[2]
Representing China, she won the singles and team gold[3][4] during the 1987 World Championships inNew Delhi,India.[2] However, she left the national team soon after as a result of her decision to not throw away matches to her teammates.[5] The 1987 world championship semi-finals featured 3 Chinese women and the KoreanYang Young-Ja. In the first semi-final, China's Dai Lily led 18–12 in the final set but she blew the lead and lost 21–18 to Yang Young-Ja. It is alleged that the Chinese coaches (Zhang, Xielin) thought that Guan Jianhua had a better chance of beating Yang Young-Ja in the final, and ordered He Zhili to lose the semi-final. She refused to obey the order and won the match. The Chinese coaches had no option but to support her in the final to increase the country's tally of medals. Though He Zhili beat Yang Young-Ja, she left the team because of the incident and migrated to Japan.
He Zhili married and later divorced, Hideyuki Koyama, a Japanese national and settled in Japan.[5] She adopted her husband's surname (her given name “Chire” is the Japanese pronunciation of the same Chinese characters of “Zhili”).[5]
China, then
Japan
