They poured out of the gates of the Bird's Nest Stadium in silent processions, tens of thousands of Chinese fans united by a common sense of disappointment. Half an hour earlier they had filled the stands, screaming the name of Liu Xiang. After seeing their hero limp from the track, they formed one vast, quiet exodus.

“We never expected he would quit the Games like that,” a young man from Beijing, standing for one last disconsolate photograph in front of the stadium, said. “It's bad for us, it's bad for all Chinese. We thought he could get gold in the hurdles. Now, nothing.”

Michael Chiu, 25, a first-generation Chinese American, had travelled from Boston with four tickets to see the 110metres heats, and another four tickets to the final on Thursday. “Watching him leave, it felt like being punched in the stomach,” he said.

Outside the Olympic Park, another ticket-holder said that he had bought track and field tickets only to see Liu. “I guess many people who bought tickets from touts bought them just to see him,” he said. Before yesterday's ill-fated heat six, tickets for the final had been selling for up to 5,000yuan (about £390). As news filtered out from the stadium, prices plummeted. “They'll still go for 2,500,” an American tout said outside. “They're final tickets.” Others were not so sure. One Chinese tout was selling tickets for 2,000yuan but halved the price.

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In the other sports venues, Chinese fans for a moment ceased their good-natured cheering. “The Chinese team has no hope now because the other athletes don't have his ability,” a man in his thirties, who was watching Australia play Lithuania in basketball, said. A young student beside him complained of “a great pain in my heart”.

On the Beijing underground, carriages echoed with the same phrases: “Have you heard?”, “I can't believe it”, “What do you think happened?” On a street to the east of the city, Yang Chou, 27, found out by text. “America and Africa always dominate athletics, so Liu Xiang was really one of our best hopes,” he said.

Others felt the withdrawal reflected one of the 36 strategies propounded in a classic Chinese text on the art of war: “Ji zou wei shang ce”. “To leave is the best choice sometimes.”