Chinese commentators refused to say Mesut Ozil's name whilst watching Arsenal's 1-1 draw at Bournemouth on Thursday.

Broadcasters in China scrapped Arsenal games from being shown on TV after Ozil's social media comments about the alleged persecution of Uighur Muslims in China.

When the starting XI was being read out, the narrators mentioned every player's name except Ozil.

Chinese commentators refused to say Mesut Ozil's name whilst watching Arsenal's 1-1 draw

WHAT HAS OZIL SAID? On his Instagram and Twitter pages, Ozil spoke out about China's treatment of Uighur Muslims with this statement: 'East Turkistan, the bleeding wound of the Ummah, resisting against the persecutors trying to separate them from their religion. They burn their Qurans. They shut down their mosques. 'They ban their schools. They kill their holy men. The men are forced into camps and their families are forced to live with Chinese men. The women are forced to marry Chinese men. 'But Muslims are silent. They won't make a noise. They have abandoned them. Don't they know that giving consent for persecution is persecution itself?' Advertisement

The commentators didn't acknowledge the German international in the game either, and didn't say his name when he was substituted.

Ozil has also been removed from the 2020 version of video game Pro Evolution Soccer (PES) in China.

In Twitter and Instagram posts, the German midfielder called Uighurs 'warriors who resist persecution' after a United Nations report suggested more than one million Uighurs had been detained in internment camps, while also accusing the Chinese government of burning The Quran and tearing down mosques.

China hit back at his claims, with the country's foreign ministry saying he had been 'blinded and misled' and invited him to the region.

Premier League clubs are fearful of losing hundreds of millions of pounds in future television and sponsorship revenue from China as the state broadcaster CCTV has continued to refuse to show any Arsenal matches.