Return to 2002: Freestyle Superstar

Chapter 660 Pressure can't defeat me! (4K)

This is the benefit of controlling public opinion!
Chen Ran is different from other athletes. He made sacrifices to participate in the Olympics.

In other events, even football players, the number one sport, can get huge bonuses by participating in the Olympic Games, but Chen Ran is the only one who is doing voluntary labor.

He is independent of the Tennis Sports Management Center and does not normally occupy the association's funds.

Chen Ran can only get the corresponding bonus if he gets a medal.

But these bonuses are nothing compared to the bonuses Chen Ran received for withdrawing from the two Masters tournaments.

This does not include up to 2000 professional competition points.

In short, he fought in the Olympics for national honor, pure and simple.

The Chinese national football team gets such high salaries, they deserve to be criticized! What about Chen Ran? He doesn't get a salary, but a bonus. He is competing with all the top players in the tennis world, so you have nothing to be jealous of.

Then, the media continued to popularize the conflicts between the ATP Professional Tennis Association and the ITF International Tennis Federation to the Chinese audience, and these conflicts also affected the Olympic schedule.

Therefore, the almost maddening schedule of Olympic tennis is completely different from other events.

Chen Ran competed almost every day, under the scorching sun in the hottest days of summer in Beijing.

Is there anything more terrifying than this?
Like basketball or football games, the group stage has not yet been completed, but the tennis game has already come to an end.

Even Chen Ran himself directly stated that arranging the competition in this way was too inhumane. Some tennis matches even ended after midnight.

what is this?
Does the Olympic tennis competition also want to pay tribute to the night games of the Grand Slam tournaments?
However, despite all his complaints, Chen Ran still had to take the field as usual on the fourth match day. Fortunately, he had made good strategic arrangements for the previous three matches and had sufficient physical reserves, so he did not look too tired.

But he threw a smoke bomb to the outside world.

"Indeed, I have competed for three consecutive days, and today is the fourth consecutive day. This is a huge test!" Chen Ran said slowly, "I have never encountered such a situation in my previous career."

"there has never been!"

He emphasized it again through gritted teeth.

Chen Ran’s words were also amplified by the media, putting pressure on the ITF and the Olympic Committee.

"The world's No. 1 player expressed his dissatisfaction and criticized the arrangement of tennis events at the Olympics!"

As a representative of the players' union, Chen Ran's words also attracted the support of many professional tennis players.

We are opponents, but it is indeed too tiring.

The competitions were either scheduled late at night or in broad daylight, and they had to be fought continuously under the scorching sun.

The International Tennis Federation wants to use the Olympics to promote tennis, but has never considered the feelings of the players?

……

At this time, the Chinese government also remained silent.

Emotionally, they stand on Chen Ran's side.

Racing every day under the scorching sun is indeed very tiring.

But after all, this is the Olympics being held in our home country. It is beyond everyone's expectation that you can still do this at this critical juncture.

Can't you just focus on the competition honestly like other Chinese athletes?
During the Olympics? How much news did you make?
Withdrawal from the Toronto Masters dominated the sports headlines of the day;

Then he withdrew from the Cincinnati Masters, dominating the sports headlines that day.

Immediately afterwards, Chen Ran blasted the International Tennis Federation and the Olympic Committee's schedule, continuing to make headlines.

You guys have always been living on the headlines, right?

It's only been 3 days since the opening.

Chen Ran overshadowed many Chinese gold medalists.

The masters were silent, but they didn't dare to scold.

Currently, China's gold medal winners are mainly athletes in shooting, diving, judo and weightlifting.

However, at this moment, apart from the Chinese national football team's poor performance which made the headlines notorious for a while, the rest of the headlines were all about Chen Ran.

The world's number one team sport and the world's number one individual sport have always occupied most of the attention.

Then, basketball also grabbed a lot of news coverage.

Because the Chinese men's basketball team had a rare explosive performance, they led the World Championship champion Spanish men's basketball team almost the entire game, and the maximum lead was even as high as 15 points. However, before the end of the game, they were tied by the Spanish men's basketball team and were defeated in overtime.

This made hundreds of millions of basketball fans in China feel disappointed, as if they were suddenly deflated at the moment of climax.

Yao Ming, the leader of the Chinese men's basketball team, was sent off due to five fouls and had to miss the victory. He was so angry that he smashed the floor.

Because there were no fan girls flooding into the sports circle in this era, and public opinion in this era was relatively free, the voices on sports events on the Internet were basically controlled by young men.

"Damn it, we lost shamefully in football and pathetically in basketball. The few gold medals we've won so far are really boring!"

"Damn it, it's meaningless no matter how many gold medals I win in this unpopular sport!"

Such comments have been the mainstream on the Internet during the 2008 Olympics, which is completely different from the official media's tone that the Chinese sports delegation is in a good situation.

Portal websites have the most sensitive sense of smell. They know which popular events netizens like to watch and will not deliberately push them just because someone wins a gold medal.

The website editors first scolded the Chinese national football team, and then secretly stepped on the head coach of the men's basketball team, Jonas, who made serious mistakes in the deployment of troops in a crucial game, and then released the news of Chen Ran's criticism, which attracted a wave of attention.

The traffic is understood by them.

This also makes the leaders of these gold-winning projects feel helpless. Are you still here to steal our limelight at this time?
……

"So far, the progress of this Olympics seems to be following the trajectory of the previous life. Of course, tennis is different."

Chen Ran also watched the progress of the game silently.

But he also knew that Liu Xiang's injury was not serious and he would not withdraw from the competition this time.

But to be honest, those black uncles are in too good shape, so it will be very difficult for him to defend his title.

It is indeed not easy for a yellow man to compete with a group of black uncles.

On this day, Chen Ran faced off against Chilean star Gonzalez.

In the original time and space, this guy made it to the finals and finally lost to Nadal and finished second.

In this game, Gonzalez played like a chicken with its blood pumped up, playing particularly crazily.

After all, Gonzalez grew up on clay courts, and the scorching sun had little effect on him.

The Olympic Games held every four years make it too easy for South American players to get excited and perform beyond their level.

For example, this is the case with Chilean tennis player Massu.

In the original time and space, this person won the men's singles and men's doubles gold medals at the Athens Olympics, but in this life, he was disturbed by Chen Ran.

"It's broken!"

"The crazy South American actually managed to break the serve!"

The ESPN host roared excitedly.

Could it be that an earthquake will occur at the Diamond Stadium in Yanjing, China today?

Immediately afterwards, Gonzalez held his serve to win the first set 7-5.

Seeing the South Americans getting more and more excited, the experienced Chen Ran decisively called out "Bathroom break" and then walked towards the player tunnel with his tennis bag. Many Chinese viewers who were watching a tennis match for the first time also asked some ridiculous jokes.

"Could it be that Chen Ran can't beat his opponent and wants to run away? Is this the best in the world?"

"Idiot, you're obviously an Olympic fan who only attends the Olympics once every four years. He just went to the bathroom, which is normal in a tennis match."

"You usually watch tennis. You are amazing. You are so noble."

This year's Olympic tennis competition also led to frequent verbal battles between tennis fans and non-tennis fans.

On the other side, Chen Ran was trying to calm himself down in the bathroom.

We have reached the quarterfinals, so we must not be careless.

Gonzalez has also beaten himself in the tour, although he was not in his best condition at the time.

But don't forget that Gonzalez was in much better shape today than in previous tours and even Grand Slams.

It can only be said that South American players are gifted and tend to be very motivated when representing their country in competitions.

No matter how he criticized the Olympic tennis schedule before the game, this was just part of Chen Ran's smokescreen to make the outside world think that his physical condition was not at its best.

Indeed, such a frequent competition density will affect Chen Ran's condition, but overall, it is still within the controllable range.

"This is not a Grand Slam tournament. If you lose one more set, you really have to go home. There will be no chance for you to come back from 2-0 down."

Chen Ran stared at himself in the mirror, took deep breaths, and washed his face with cold water from time to time to calm himself down.

He must get back into his game as soon as possible.

In fact, he knows that he has never been a chicken-blood player, but has always been known for his stable output.

"I can't let an earthquake happen at the Diamond!"

8 minutes later, no more, no less, Chen Ran returned to the court on time.

Gonzalez also frowned, knowing that the other party was deliberately pushing the time on the line.

Isn't the other party trying to use this to cool down his hot hands?
Gonzalez was no stranger to this scene.

After all, he is also a veteran who has been famous for many years.

"I was in very good shape at this year's Olympics. If I hadn't met Chen Ran, I would have probably made it to the semifinals or even the finals. Of course, even if I met him, it's not impossible for me to go further."

But he was also a little surprised to see Chen Ran's calm face.

"Why can he still be so calm?"

"After all, this is an Olympic competition, not a Grand Slam competition. Chen Ran is carrying the pressure of the entire country alone. At this stage, he should be overwhelmed under normal circumstances."

Indeed, many Grand Slam champion-level tennis players have performed poorly in the past when participating in Olympic Games because they were overwhelmed by the expectations of the entire country.

This is nothing new.

Players like Federer and Nadal also had a very difficult time in this year's Olympics.

But Chen Ran can still remain so calm.

"We lost the Grand Slam this time, but we can win it back next time."

"But the Olympics are different. If you lose this time, you will have to wait four years. You can even say that it is unknown whether you will have another four years."

Chen Ran actually knew that he had found the reason.

The enormous pressure, coupled with the influence of various objective factors, makes it impossible for me to perform at my normal level.

If he could access the Internet now, he would definitely know that there is a huge uproar on the Internet.

Even many pessimistic people are already shouting that Chen Ran will be eliminated in the quarterfinals.

"clam down!"

He took a deep breath and walked towards the court.

Gonzalez suddenly became a little nervous, because few people could be ahead of Chen Ran, especially in the knockout round of the Olympics.

He was in the lead and victory was just around the corner, but when he saw Chen Ran's firm eyes and calm expression, he couldn't help but get nervous.

“Is now the most dangerous moment?”

He remembered Rod Laver's famous saying that the most dangerous moment in a tennis match is when you are ahead.

Sure enough, Chen Ran was calmer in the second game than in the first.

Gonzalez only lasted two service games before Chen Ran broke his serve.

After breaking the serve, his mentality was seriously affected and he was broken by Chen Ran again.

In the second set, he lost the game with a huge score of 2 to 6.

Gonzalez's competitive state was completely different from that in the first set.

"He has an idea, and once he has an idea, he can't commit to it fully." The ESPN host also noticed some clues.

When facing an opponent of Chen Ran's level, the closer you are to victory, the easier it is to lose focus.

In the third set, is there still suspense?

Just when many people thought that the third set would be one-sided, both sides seemed to forget the pressure in this set, and went all out, launching a wonderful offensive battle.

Chen Ran was also amazed at Gonzalez's ability to adjust, and how he was able to recover so quickly from the defeat in the second set.

In this set, Chen Ran served first and Gonzalez served later.

He was very focused and didn't lose any serve.

Throughout, he kept putting pressure on Gonzalez's serve.

It was not until Gonzalez's sixth serving game that Chen Ran launched another offensive and brought his "world's best serve receiving ability" to the extreme.

He also tried his best.

Although he had a better chance of winning the tie-break, Chen Ran still hoped to end the battle in the regular rounds.

With the Chilean in such high spirits, there are still some uncertainties in the tie-break.

"What a perfect serve receiving ability."

"Even facing such a high-quality first serve, Chen Ran was still able to return the ball so deep, almost pressing the baseline several times, making the opponent's return very uncomfortable!"

This is a battle between the ultimate return and the ultimate serve.

Through patient planning and more than a dozen rounds of maneuvers, Chen Ran gradually found an opportunity to counterattack and won with one strike.

In the twelfth game of the third set, after Chen Ran and Gonzalez had been tied at 9 for 40 times, Chen Ran finally seized the fifth break point and completed the break.

7 is better than 5!

Chen Ran won the toughest battle in the Olympics so far.

He finally withstood the tremendous pressure.

……

(End of this chapter)