Chinese goalkeeper Wang Dalei caused an uproar as he responded to criticisms of China's soccer loss with outbursts filled with expletives.
Chinese media blasted at the team's poor performance in their 3-0 loss to Japan in their Asian Games opener on Monday, singling out Wang as one of the worst players.
Wang, who had once been linked with Italian giant Inter Milan, was especially blamed for Japan's second goal that he tried to save.
A national TV commentator compared Wang to "volleyballer", saying his save was amateur.
Wang reacted by filling his microblog on a popular Internet portal with angry outbursts, calling Chinese soccer fans "morons" and reporters "haters of Chinese soccer".
"I heard that there are 7,000 professional soccer reporters (in China) and I guess 4,000 of them must hate soccer," Wang wrote. "Is that really necessary?
"I'm not a 'Spiderman'. I punched the ball out, but you guys still laugh at me. I was beaten on the pitch and verbally abused off. Don't say you know how to play soccer. Because you know nothing about it.
"Go home and first count how many pieces of leather a football has. 'Hit a person when he is down', that's what you bastards are doing. That's why Chinese soccer is a mess."
Wang's hysterical fightback shocked both netizens and media. Most of them showed no tolerance to the unruly brush-cut boy, saying he was not qualified as a national team player.
Wang wouldn't lower his head.
"I didn't use dirty words. If you think I did, that's your problem," said Wang after Tuesday's training for next match against Kyrgyzstan.
"I don't give a shit to what other people would say. That's who I am," he added.
Chinese stand-in team coach Sun Wei apparently knew what had happened, asking media to concentrate on China's next game on Wednesday instead.