Chinese star badminton player Li Xuerui announced her retirement from international badminton, according to the Badminton World Federation (BWF) on Thursday.

"Former Olympic champion Li Xuerui has announced her retirement from international badminton. Li, 28, was among the most dominant players of her time before an injury at the Rio Olympics disrupted her career," wrote the world's badminton governing body on its official website.

Tencent Sports reached out to Li following the news and learned that she decided only to retire from international competitions, not put an end to her badminton career. Li is currently preparing for the Military World Games in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. She told Tencent Sports that after the Military Games, she will go back to the PLA badminton team.

Born in 1991, Li was selected for the Chinese national team in 2010. Two years later, she claimed 30 consecutive victories in different international events in early 2012 before sweeping her way into women's singles final at the Summer Olympics in London and defeating her teammate Wang Yihan to win the gold medal.

Four years later, Li attended the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and continued to be unstoppable until the semifinals. In the match against Spanish star Carolina Marin, Li suffered an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) rupture in her left leg, which not only cost her the match, but also kept her away from the court for a year.

In August 2017, Li returned to the Chinese National Games in Tianjin. Next April, she made her international comeback at the Lingshui China Masters and won the women's singles title. Having won a total of four championships in 2018, Li moved from No. 247 to No. 25 in the world rankings.

However, an ACL rupture is one of the most devastating injuries that could happen to her, so it held Li back from returning to her peak. She withdrew from the match against Japan's Sayaka Takahashi at the Korea Open in late September, which became her last international event.