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踢皮球

Mandarin · pinyin tī pí qiú

to kick a ball around
(fig.) to mutually shirk responsibility
to pass the buck

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Characters in this entry

踢: tī · kick
皮: pí · skin, hide, fur, feather; outer
球: qiú · ball, sphere, globe; round

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

1–2–2 · ti1 pi2 qiu2

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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Rime Cantonese 粵拼

tek3 pei4 kau4

Cantonese word readings for 踢皮球. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

verb

(literal) to kick a ball around
(figurative) to pass the buck; to avoid responsibility and pass it off to each other

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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