Return to 2002: Freestyle Superstar

Chapter 197: Entering the Clay Court Masters final for the first time! (4K)

Chen Ran’s strong performance at the Madrid Masters continues.

As his coach Zhang Depei previously said, Chen Ran's strength on clay courts is almost the same as that of hard courts.

The progress of the game was as everyone predicted before the game.

Chen Ran was full of momentum and won the first set with 6:3.

In the first set, Chen Ran was obviously the one who wanted to enter the finals more, and he showed excellent competitive form from the beginning.

Instead, Novak acted a little impatient and urgent.

Perhaps this guy wanted to prove that his ability to enter the Australian Open finals was not a "gift" from Chen Ran, but it seemed to backfire.

Chen Ran showed extremely high efficiency and it only took 35 minutes to win the set.

At this time, almost everyone believed that Chen Ran would successfully defeat Novak and easily reach the finals.

Even Zidane in the audience was smiling. In his opinion, this tennis match would not consume too much time.

But after the start of the second set, things changed.

Novak began to get better and performed better and better, constantly putting pressure on Chen Ran. Amid the exclamations of the audience, he actually won the second set 7:5.

The second set took almost twice as long as the first set.

This is the game of tennis, there are always endless possibilities.

"Chen Ran once found a break point in the No. 11 game, but unfortunately he failed to seize the opportunity."

"Perhaps it was in response to that sentence that Novak seized the break opportunity in the No. 12 game."

The C5 host wiped the sweat from his forehead with a hint of nervousness in his tone.

This should be the first time they broadcast Chen Ran's clay court match, but the match entered a deciding set.

He was worried that the audience would complain about CCTV's disaster star.

In competitive sports, when experts compete with each other, they often compete on psychology and will.

The more critical the moment, the more determined the party can often achieve the final victory.

Because of this, Chen Ran also knew the reason why he lost the second set.

Psychological fluctuations and laxity of will.

First of all, the easy victory in the first set gave Chen Ran the mentality of having entered the finals with both feet.

The anxiety of the second set was somewhat beyond his expectation.

Especially when Chen Ran finally got a break point, he became the more impatient party.

Novak is also considered a first-class player in the world and has rich clay court experience.

In a desperate move, he not only scored consecutive points and reversed course to hold serve, but he was also so powerful in Chen Ran's next service game that he incredibly broke serve and evened the score tenaciously.

The balance of victory and defeat also seems to have begun to undergo subtle changes.

"Will this be my first Masters final?" Novak clenched his fists tightly. "Even if I can win a second place in the Clay Masters, it will be a huge improvement for my career."

As a model worker type player, he has a 500 race and several 250 race championships.

In addition, there are many runner-up trophies in these events, including a Grand Slam runner-up.

Of course, many people questioned that the runner-up had too much luck.

The Masters is an important event, and even a runner-up trophy is worth more than a 500-race winner.

This time, for him and Chen Ran to meet in the semi-finals of the Clay Court Masters, it seemed that God gave him a chance to prove himself.

"Although I am older than Chen Ran and have participated in the tour for more time, he is the winner of the 'Sunshine Double Crown', and I am just an older challenger." Novak's mentality is very good.

For some people, they may not be able to accept that a guy who was an unknown person a few months ago suddenly soars into the sky, surpassing them in terms of honor, crushing them in terms of attention, and even beating themselves in terms of income.

Because according to predictions by some tennis organizations, after winning the "Sunshine Double", Chen Ran's comprehensive income from bonuses and endorsement fees is very likely to be among the top three tennis players.

Behind their Chinese nationality, there is a huge market to rely on.

What's the use of being envious?

Novak accepted this sense of gap calmly and could only play with peace of mind.

"The players from Eastern Europe have amazing willpower!"

Chen Ran sat on the chair, took a deep breath, picked up a towel and wiped his head gently.

Several times, he felt that he could defeat Novak with just a little more force, but instead, the opponent launched desperate counterattacks from the edge of collapse time and time again.

"Perhaps the most powerful thing about these players from the Balkans is their mental attributes!"

Chen Ran's current mental attribute is 84, which barely meets the standards of a first-class player.

The level of mental attributes determines how much a player's state fluctuates during the game.

"If my mental attributes were 90, or even 88, I should be able to react immediately when I failed to break serve just now and had slight fluctuations in my mentality."

Chen Ran realized that the attribute values ​​​​he had brushed before were basically allocated to physical attributes and technical attributes. Now he must pay attention to the improvement of mental attributes.

A tennis match is somewhat similar to a marathon. The positions of the leader and the chaser may change at any moment, and your mentality will also change accordingly.

This is an individual sport and no one can take the pressure off of you.

Everything that happens on the court must be faced by you alone.

In tennis matches, even the coach can only sit in the audience and can only use hand gestures to communicate with the players.

The 2 minutes of rest between sets flew by.

"Novak, this is a respectable opponent!"

"Although some Chinese media are always nagging in my ears that if I hadn't been injured at the Australian Open, I should still have reached the finals."

"But I think you deserve to be in that Grand Slam final!"

Chen Ran began to consciously slightly increase the time he took to shoot the ball to adjust his serving rhythm.

Throw the ball, kick the ball, swing the racket!
Chen Ran's serve quality is acceptable, but on clay courts, due to the significant reduction in ball speed, he needs to pay more attention to placement and spin.

Novak, who was getting better and better, began to exert all his strength, and Chen Ran was once oppressed to the point of being very embarrassed.

Under an almost suffocating attack and defense, three games ended.

1: 2!

Chen Ran was broken again in his second service game.

You must know that he served first in the deciding set.

This is an advantage and a disadvantage.

If the hold is successful, the pressure will be on the opponent; but if the opponent breaks serve, the pressure will be on yourself.

Soon, Novak won another service game of his own.

3:1, he extended the point difference to two games.

Chen Ran was unwilling to just surrender, but he had to admit that Novak was in an almost crazy state at this moment. His confidence was rising steadily, and the success rate of his attacks remained high. Buddha.

"I need to calm down..."

Chen Ran didn't think that the other party's "super god" state could last forever.

Because such a high-frequency state consumes physical and mental energy more intensely and fiercely, once the spirit relaxes, the physical critical point will surge exponentially.

Although Chen Ran has never experienced this in real-world competitions, he has experienced it several times in the "simulation training ground".

There, his physical condition is consistent with the real world.So what should Chen Ran do?
Adjust your physical strength, be ready to go, and stay calm. Not only do you need to wait patiently for the opportunity, but you must not mess up after the opportunity arises.

As a result, Chen Ran began to hit the ball constantly on the clay baseline, and had an extreme tug-of-war with his opponent. Almost every return ball pressed against the opponent's baseline, making Novak's ball very uncomfortable.

Use some maneuvers, tactics, and layouts to extend the stalemate time of the round ball as much as possible to consume Novak's energy and reduce Novak's success rate and threat.

On the one hand, it preserves one's physical strength so that one can suddenly exert force during the most critical period.

Chen Ran first seemed to have difficulty holding his own serve, chasing the score to 2:3.

Then he continued to put pressure on Novak's serve, making it look very difficult for the opponent to hold serve.

Through changes in tactics and playing styles, Chen Ran found that Novak's state had fluctuated slightly, and he was no longer in the "super god" state he had before.

The duel between the two sides became more and more intense, and more than 1 spectators held their breath...

Kicking off the ground, taking a step forward, taking the lead, Chen Ran struck out with a strong forehand.

He seized the golden opportunity, took a big step directly to the baseline, increased his hitting rhythm, and hit the ball with strong topspin forehand.

Chen Ran suddenly changed his rhythm, causing the tennis ball to fly faster.

Novak did not adapt for a while, causing the return ball to go directly into the net.

AD: 40!

Chen Ran once again got a break point.

On the next ball, after more than 20 shots of back and forth between the two sides, Chen Ran completed a shot from a small angle and went straight to the net to score a volley, finally breaking serve.

draw!

4 is better than 4!

Chen Ran finally filled the hole dug at the beginning of the third set.

The game continues...

Chen Ran must admit that the willpower of Eastern European players is really strong, especially first-class players like Novak.

In the 12th and [-]th games of the third set, Chen Ran reached the break point of the game.

It is also the match point of the entire game!
As long as Chen Ran wins one more ball, he can reach the final of the Madrid Masters.

However, Novak relied on his super willpower to hold on to his remaining serve, leaving no chance for Chen Ran to break serve for the second time.

6 is better than 6!

The two sides entered a tie-break in the final set!
In the C5 Sports live broadcast room, the host Zhang Sheng sighed a little.

How late is it now?It's already 5 o'clock in the morning!
The game lasted from 2 am to 5 am.

Because the game time is not very friendly, no guests came today.

After all, being a guest commentator for CCTV doesn't cost much, so it's not worth staying up late for it.

So Zhang Sheng can only bear silently everything today.

He took a look at the comments posted by netizens.

After all, the game started at two o'clock in the morning, and the number of people was much smaller than before.

Everyone is complaining that if CCTV did not broadcast it live, Chen Ran might have entered the finals, which would be a disaster.

But CCTV doesn’t broadcast live, so you can only go to external networks to find signal sources.

Speaking of which, this is indeed the first time that CCTV has broadcast Chen Ran's game after early morning.

Previous Oceania seasons, including the Australian Open, were played in the afternoon or evening.

The "Sunshine Double" in North America is basically held in the morning.

Only these games in Europe are very unfriendly in terms of time.

In the past, only the French Open and Wimbledon were broadcast on CCTV after midnight.

It seems that the sudden appearance of Chen Ran will give him many more sleepless nights from now on...

Perhaps it was his first tiebreaker on a clay court. Chen Ran, who was hailed as the "King of tiebreakers" by the Chinese media, did not show a strong enough side.

Neither side could complete a mini-break, and the score was very anxious, reaching 5-5 in the blink of an eye.

Novak continued with his second serve.

Second district, inner corner!
This time, Novak did not use the classic outside corner backhand tactic of the second zone, but instead sneaked into an inside corner.

The ball speed of this serve was also very fast, reaching 200 kilometers.

boom!
The tennis ball hit the ground, splashing some red clay.

This time, Chen Ran did not start in advance, but took a big step and extended his forehand.

A light touch!
Chen Ran handled this ball very carefully. He did not risk a direct attack. Instead, he wrapped the tennis ball and hit it back to the court along the middle.

After Novak saw Chen Ran's return, he turned sideways and fired a forehand.

Chen Ran kept his attention [-]% concentrated, repeated his old backhand trick with both hands, pulled out a super topspin deep ball from the baseline, and pushed the tennis ball back.

The two of them just attacked and defended like this, once again launching an extreme tug of war, but neither seemed able to defeat the other in one go.

However, in the midst of the flash of lightning, Chen Ran kicked his feet on the ground and suddenly turned sideways.

Chen Ran clearly felt his feet touching the ground, and there was a continuous soft texture, which was natural and very comfortable.

At the same time, Chen Ran's wrist made an obvious speed-up movement, and the backhand with both hands increased the speed of the racket head.

boom!
The power in his arm exploded instantly.

This time, Chen Ran used the hard-court hitting method on the clay court, and the entire flat hitting was completely released.

The tennis ball turned into a stream of light and flew directly to the opposite baseline blind corner with unparalleled speed and power.

After smashing a deep earth mark, he jumped into the distance.

Novak stared at this extraordinary save without making any reaction.

6: 5!

This time the first mini-break of the tie-break finally appeared!

Likewise, match point appeared again.

Then exchange serves.

Chen Ran must win the first serve to win immediately.

If you lose the first serve and win the second serve, the game will still be extended.

Zone 1, outer corner.

A serve with strong external spin!
Novak staggered to save the ball, and then immediately ran towards the center line of the court.

The poor quality of the return made him feel extremely desperate.

Chen Ran seemed to be about to continue hitting the ball, but suddenly he flicked his wrist and released a short ball that was out of reach of Novak.

7: 5!

After nearly three hours of fierce battle, Chen Ran finally won the victory 2-1 and advanced to the final of the Madrid Masters.

……

(End of this chapter)