Return to 2002: Freestyle Superstar

Chapter 729: Turning against Tiangang!
Chen Ran did not watch the first women's singles semi-final because he felt that Zheng Qinwen's chance of winning was too low.

The odds given by the bookmakers for Swiatek are 1 to 1.05. The odds for the Chinese national team playing against Brazil and Argentina may not be that low.

Look at those guys who usually like to place bets, they shake their heads when they see these odds.

Even these experienced spinach players don’t want to place bets for such a small amount of money, and they won’t make much money even if they win.

There is no point in betting on a match with no suspense and extremely low odds.

Chen Ran's semi-final will be held after Zheng Qinwen's semi-final.

At this moment, he was wearing headphones and warming up on a bicycle in the gym in the rest area behind the court.

The sound insulation here is good, and Chen Ran can't hear the noise in the stadium.

When the game had been going on for about 1 hour and 20 minutes, a staff member hurried over to tell Chen Ran that the previous women's singles semi-final had ended and he needed to enter the venue to prepare for the game.

Chen Ran lowered his head and glanced at his watch, and had a general idea in his mind.

This match should be over in two sets.

Who's winning?
Of course it must be Swiatek!
He couldn't think of any reason why the queen of clay would lose at Roland Garros.

He has been undefeated at the French Open for three years.

You have to know that in this time and space, because of his own rise, Nadal's advantage in the French Open has been greatly reduced, and he has never achieved three consecutive championships.

Chen Ran, the "goat" of tennis, has only won two consecutive French Open titles, and he knows how difficult it is.

"Xiao Zheng should focus on preparing for the bronze medal match," he thought to himself.

After all, so far in Chinese women's tennis, only Li Na has won a gold medal, and Zheng Jie has won a bronze medal.

Chen Ran's attention was all on the upcoming match with Djokovic, so he didn't open his phone. He only saw many unread messages on WeChat.

He threw his phone into his backpack and walked towards the court with great momentum.

When Chen Ran entered the venue, he habitually looked towards the box of the Chinese tennis team, where the staff of the Tennis Association were sitting.

What the hell?

What we saw was Director Bai dancing excitedly on the spot with his hands raised high, while other staff members, including Zheng Qinwen, hugged each other happily.

She also walked into the private room and happily high-fived everyone.

Could it be that……

How can this be?

However, Chen Ran heard a faint crying sound.

He followed the sound and looked far away, and saw Poland's clay queen Swiatek squatting on the ground crying in pain.

A male reporter from the Polish National Television stood aside, scratching his hair awkwardly, not knowing whether to go forward to comfort the woman or stay where he was. He felt extremely embarrassed.

Finally, this guy slowly uttered a sentence: "This defeat makes Iga extremely sad!"

"Xiao Zheng actually won?" Chen Ran finally came back to his senses from his shock.

This is even less likely than the Chinese national football team winning against Brazil or Argentina, and she actually created such a big upset!

What does this amount to?
Chen Ran, who was at his peak, lost to Roddick, that clay-clay loser, at the French Open!
Because Zheng Qinwen and Roddick's best results at the French Open were both the round of 16.

The host on the scene said slowly: "The next semi-final is about to begin. Chen Ran and Djokovic, this is a matchup we have been looking forward to for a long time."

At this time, the Chinese reporters in the media area also came back to their senses from the ecstasy they had just experienced.

"There shouldn't be an upset in this game, right?"

"For Chen Ran, he has to go all out because he hopes to have a perfect farewell performance, but Djokovic already has an Olympic gold medal and there are still competitions to come, so he probably won't try so hard."

There is a one-year age difference between the two.

This is actually completely negligible.

"Chen Ran, come on!"

"Revenge for the last Tokyo Olympics!"

At the last Tokyo Olympics, Djokovic, who was in great form, defeated Chen Ran in the semi-finals, successfully won the gold medal and completed the Golden Slam.

This is also the change caused by Chen Ran.

Because Chen Ran always signed up for singles in the Olympics, and in order to have sufficient physical strength, he did not play mixed doubles or doubles, so Djokovic followed suit and did not compete in three events like he did in his previous life.

At this moment, Djokovic was warming up with mixed feelings. The competition between the two of them has been going on for nearly 20 years.

To be more specific, it has been 2007 years since he first reached the Grand Slam final in 17 and became competitive with Chen Ran.

During this long period of competition, the two gradually developed a friendship.

From Djokovic's perspective, he also hopes that Chen Ran can have a perfect farewell.

But this does not mean that he will give in in this game.

"I already have two bronze medals. What's the use of one more?" the Serbian thought to himself.

But Chen Ran was thinking, you already have a gold medal and have achieved the Golden Grand Slam, so you should have no regrets or obsessions.

Both of them had smiles on their faces, but each had their own plans.

An hour later...

The weather in Paris was already hot at 30°+, and clay court matches were extremely physically demanding, so Chen Ran was gasping for breath.

The difficulty of this game was beyond his imagination.

Djokovic played very hard and seriously.

This guy also seems to be eager for this gold medal.

After all, this is an Olympic gold medal won on the holy land of red clay, just as the Olympic gold medal won on the holy land of grass in 2012, which is of great significance.

Olympic tennis matches held on Grand Slam courts only occur once every few decades, and are a rare opportunity.

Djokovic wants to get it too!

The next Olympic Games will be held in Los Angeles, and this city and New York are located in the south and north of the United States, so it is impossible for tennis matches to be held on the US Open venue.

In addition, Murray also has a gold medal, and Djokovic naturally hopes that he can surpass Murray in the number of gold medals.

This is a guy with a very competitive spirit.

An hour later, the two sides were tied at 6-6 and entered the tie-break.

In this tense match, breaking the serve was a very difficult task for both sides.

"These two old guys are working so hard for an Olympics without any points or prize money. Don't some people feel ashamed?" the host joked.

I'm talking about you, Yao Jiaxin!
In the seventh game, Chen Ran was still more skilled.

With their physical strength almost reaching a bottleneck, the two players sent moon balls to each other, waiting for their opponents to change lines and make mistakes.

Chen Ran was more patient, while Djokovic knew that wasting time on Chen Ran's high-quality moon balls was not a solution, so he took the initiative to launch an offensive, but ended up hitting the ball into the net.

7 to 6 (7:5), Chen Ran won the first set with difficulty.

In the second set, Chen Ran thought Djokovic would not fight as hard as he did in the first set.

As a result, the guy remained full of fighting spirit, tried his best and kept the score close.

In this set, both sides entered the tiebreak again.

However, this time, Djokovic finally couldn't keep up with Chen Ran's rhythm in the tiebreak and lost several points in a row.

Facing Chen Ran, it is difficult to keep the score close in every tiebreak.

7 is better than 2!

Chen Ran won the tie-break of the second set.

The two games lasted nearly 2 hours and 30 minutes. After the game, Chen Ran held his knees with both hands, so tired that he could hardly walk.

A best-of-three match is different from a best-of-five match in that you have to give your all from start to finish.

In the other men's singles semi-final after Chen Ran's match, Alcaraz played like crazy, sweeping Aliassim 2-6 with two goals.

Aliassim is now also one of the top ten players in the world, but he is not good enough in front of Aka and is almost vulnerable.

In the Olympic tennis singles finals, the men's match was between Chen Ran and Aka, while the women's match was between Zheng Qinwen and Vikic.

Because Aka was well rested, while Chen Ran and Djokovic were both injured in the fight.

And what is Vikichi? Can it be compared with the new giant Aka?
Soon, not only foreign media, but even some Chinese media believed that Zheng Qinwen had a greater chance of winning the gold medal than Chen Ran.

Could you imagine this before the game? It was like the reverse of the Tian Gang!
……

(End of this chapter)