Return to 2002: Freestyle Superstar

Chapter 702: Warm Moments of the Magic City Masters Tournament
In the golden October of 2019, the Qi Zhong Tennis Center in Shanghai was packed with people.

At this moment, the finals of the new Shanghai Masters Tournament are being staged.

The two opponents in the duel are 33-year-old Chen Ran and 38-year-old Federer.

Chen Ran, now 33 years old, still maintains an excellent competitive form.

However, he is not alone.

The Big Four are all already at an advanced age as professional players, especially the Swiss Federer who is already 38 years old. This also makes Chen Ran a little puzzled.

It seems that this Swiss guy once reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon when he was 40 years old.

Chen Ran also became curious about how long Federer in this time and space could hold on.

There are also Djokovic and Nadal. The four of them still maintain their amazing dominance as if they had agreed.

In the past four years, there have been a total of 16 Grand Slam titles, but they have basically been divided up among these four people.

So far, Chen Ran tops the list with 30 Grand Slam titles and is in a leading position among the Big Four, with no one competing with him.

Since participating in the Australian Open for the first time in 2003, there have been a total of 17 Grand Slam champions in the past 68 years.

Roddick, Ferrero and Wawrinka each won one.

The remaining 65 include 30 for Chen Ran, 15 for Federer, 11 for Djokovic and 9 for Nadal.

In this time and space, Nadal's dominance at the French Open is far less than in his previous life.

Because he lost to Chen Ran too many times in the French Open finals, this also gave Federer, Djokovic and others an opportunity to steal the French Open.

So far, Nadal has only won five French Open titles, two Australian Open titles, and one Wimbledon and US Open title each.

As a result, the Spaniard was also mocked by fans as an "affordable" Grand Slam winner, because except for the French Open, his performance in other Grand Slam tournaments was indeed unworthy of the title of giant.

What's more, he currently has one less French Open championship than Chen Ran's 6. The title of "God of Clay" is totally undeserved. Although Nadal has won many more clay court Masters than Chen Ran, the Grand Slam is the only standard.

This is a miserable situation for Murray, the quasi-giant in his previous life. Originally, his honors should have surpassed Wawrinka, but he encountered the heyday of the Big Four, especially on the grass courts of Wimbledon and the concrete hard courts of the US Open, where Murray is more adept.

On the grass, there are three epic grass-court geniuses: Chen Ran, Federer and Djokovic. Even if one of them takes a nap, there are still the other two.

What's more, there are few grass court masters, and it is extremely difficult for other players to steal a Wimbledon title.

In addition, on the cement hard court of the US Open, in addition to Chen Ran, the fast hard court genius, the other three giants are also very competitive. They can take advantage of Chen Ran's ups and downs to share a lot of US Open championships.

At the Australian Open on plastic hard courts, the competition has basically been between Chen Ran and Djokovic in the past decade, but Nadal and Federer can also occasionally steal a prize or two.

As for the French Open, Murray's strength on clay is very average.

Except for one championship that Wawrinka stole, the championships were basically monopolized by the Big Four, while Chen Ran and Nadal divided most of them.

But Murray was lucky, as he won a precious Olympic men's singles gold medal three years ago.

This should be the greatest honor in his career.

However, what made Murray furious was that the British royal family broke their promise and did not award him the title as promised.

In their words, we only give you a knighthood if you win the championship in London. If you win the championship in Rio de Janeiro, the significance and influence will be much less, and you will not be eligible for a knighthood.

If you want to get a knighthood, you have to at least win one more Grand Slam.

If you can win Wimbledon, you will definitely get a knighthood, and for the other three Grand Slams, the chances of getting a knighthood are probably 50-50...

What's more, Chen Ran withdrew from the Rio Olympics due to injury.

In the words of the British royal family, if you beat Chen Ran and win the championship in Rio, you will have a great chance of getting the title with an Olympic gold medal.

But Chen Ran didn’t participate in the competition!
Chen Ran has almost become a thorn in the side of the British royal family.

The British royal family has always used Chen Ran as a tool, constantly PUA Murray, and if they want the title, they have to defeat him.

It’s a pity that the opportunity he was given was useless!

Of course, Murray was also furious.

After being PUA'd by the British royal family for a long time, Murray developed an unprecedented rebellious mentality.

It’s just a stinky title, take it or leave it!

"The next time there's a Scottish independence referendum, I'll definitely vote in favor! It's a pity that referendum in 2014, I was so blind, I really regret it." Murray, who has come to his senses, has said this more than once.

But he also doesn't know when the next Scottish independence referendum will be.

Now it is 2019, and both Murray and Wawrinka have fallen out of the top ten in the world rankings.

The fifth and sixth men under these two giants seemed to have made an appointment. After entering 2019, their competitive state began to decline at a rapid speed.

But the four who are no longer young still maintain their terrifying dominance.

The last Masters tournament of 2019, which is also the ATP 1000 tournament with the highest influence and prize money, is the Shanghai Masters. The four of them once again monopolized the top four positions.

Chen Ran and Federer will meet in the final.

Why are there still four of them? Where are our young generation of players?
Players born in 90 will soon be 30 years old!

Wait, we feel that players born before 95 can no longer be counted on.

Then we can only count on players born after 95.

而这场决赛，陈然和费德勒在大战了三盘，耗时3个小时10分钟之后，终于以7比5，5比7，7比6（9:7）拿下比赛。

This is also his fifth title in the Shanghai Masters.

At the award ceremony, Chen Ran also called his family members to receive the award together.

In addition to his wife, Ivanovich, there is also his 3-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter.

Because Ivanovich's appearance is very oriental, a bit like a girl from the Western Regions, so this also means that Chen Ran's two children have almost no mixed-race features. Standing with other Chinese children, with black hair and black eyes, there is no difference at all except that they are a little prettier.

"Chen Ran, your two children are both Chinese nationals, right?"

"Of course, I hope they will have the opportunity to represent China when they grow up."

At this time, in a box in the Qi Zhong Center Stadium, a 2-meter-tall man couldn't help but sneeze.

He always felt that he was being played a trick by Chen Ran.

Not long ago, in the Basketball World Cup held in China, the poor performance of the Chinese men's basketball team caused Chinese basketball results to slide to an unprecedented low, and the little giant was under tremendous pressure.

So he was very sensitive, and when Chen Ran said that, he felt like he was being teased.

“Oh, you mean you’ll let your two kids learn tennis too?”

"Of course, why not? Their parents are born tennis players, I believe they will have talent. And I believe tennis is a good sport, it will teach children to fight independently instead of relying on others and hugging thighs."

"Tennis is very simple, because winning is winning and losing is losing. No one will look for statistics after losing and then shout that it was an honorable defeat."

“That’s why I love tennis.”

After hearing this, the little giant in the box looked even more unnatural.

Come again?

It’s fine if you did Yin and Yang once, but you keep doing Yin and Yang.

But the audience immediately burst into warm cheers, obviously they agreed with Chen Ran's statement.

"If your children become professional tennis players, what results do you expect them to achieve?"

"Enjoy the fun of this sport first. Then what I hope is... I won't set too high goals for them. If they can all get into the top 100 in the world, I will be satisfied."

"Your requirements are so low?" The host was a little unconvinced and asked Ivanovich, "Ms. Ana, do you think so too?"

"You have to know that their parents have both won the world's first place."

"Yes, I have the same idea as Chen, the top 100 in the world is enough." Ivanovic also said affirmatively, "We will not put too much pressure on the children."

"The world's best parents have such low demands. What a lucky kid!"

Finally, Chen Ran held up the championship trophy, and the family of four took a photo around it.

……

(End of this chapter)