It is worth mentioning that Senegal was included in French Africa in 1909 and was once a French colony. So far, Senegal's architecture and culture are still deeply influenced by France.
It was Kim Tae-hee's first time watching the World Cup live, and she couldn't understand why the French team also had so many black players.
Song Yi briefly explained to Kim Tae-hee the history of France's colonization in Africa. If Senegalese players land in the top five European leagues, they will definitely give priority to joining Ligue 1.
He joked that the opening match of the World Cup tonight was actually a contest between France I and France II, and that the players of both teams also had teammates from Ligue 1. However, it was embarrassing that the French team lost to Senegal 0-1.
As a football fan, Kim Jong Kook could not accept this result at all. He muttered to himself, "Isn't France the defending champion of this World Cup? France also won the championship in 1998. It's impossible that such a strong French team cannot even qualify from the group stage?"
When Song Yi heard what Kim Jong Kook said, he tried to recall the group stage of the French team in the 2002 World Cup. The French team seemed to have not won a single game, with 1 draw, 2 losses, and 1 point, ranking last in the group and being eliminated unexpectedly. The French team eventually became the first defending champion in the history of the World Cup to be eliminated in the group stage without scoring a goal. The defeat of the French team doomed the 2002 World Cup to be full of upsets.
After the game, Song Yi, Liao Yu, Kim Tae Hee and Kim Hyung Soo returned to the Seongbuk-dong villa. Liao Yu originally wanted to stay in a hotel and didn't want to stay at Song Yi's house, but Kim Tae Hee strongly invited Liao Yu to stay at her house.
On the way home, Kim Heung-soo was still complaining about the French team's poor performance. Today's opening match was very dull and uninteresting, and the French players seemed to lack fighting spirit.
Song Yi was immediately amused. "Hyun Soo, even though the French team lost today, France's cultural influence is everywhere."
"The official name of this World Cup was originally '2002 FIFA World Cup Janpan/Korea'. Translated, it means the 2002 Japan-Korea World Cup. Because according to the alphabetical order, J comes before K."
"Uncle Mengzhun took a different approach. He said that the word FIFA originated from French, which is the official language of FIFA. The founder of the World Cup, Jules Rimet, is also French. He suggested that FIFA sort the names according to French. The spelling of South Korea in French is 'Coree' and Japan is 'Japon'. In this way, South Korea was ranked ahead of Japan, and this World Cup was finally named the Korea-Japan World Cup." Song Yi and Jin Hengzhu talked about Zhou Mengzhun's little thoughts on applying to host the World Cup.
When Jin Hengzhu heard Song Yi say this, he admired Zhou Mengzhun very much. "Chairman Zhou Mengzhun is really an amazing Korean man. He won national dignity for us 50 million Koreans in front of the Japanese."
When Song Yi heard what Jin Hengzhu said, he didn't know who to tell. The ranking of a name is related to the national dignity of South Korea? No wonder after the South Korean team entered the semi-finals of the World Cup in this cup, the Koreans were collectively high in spirit, and it felt that South Korea had instantly become the most powerful country in the universe.
If the South Korean team can really make it to the World Cup finals and discredit Brazil's championship despite the world's outrage, Zhou Mengzhong, as the head of the Korean Football Association, may be able to fight his way out and win this year's South Korean presidential election.
However, Song Yi also expressed his understanding that the Korean Peninsula had been occupied by Japan since 1910 and was colonized by Japan for 35 years.
Koreans cannot defeat Japan, North Korea, or China. The flag of the White Tiger Regiment of the first president of South Korea is still on display in the Military Museum of China.
Looking at the countries surrounding South Korea, there is no country that South Koreans can defeat. If the United States had not landed in Incheon, North Korea would have driven the South Korean army into the sea and unified the Korean Peninsula.
If Zhou Mengzhun can play tricks on Japan and gain an advantage, it is a diplomatic victory. Many Koreans have regarded Zhou Mengzhun as a national hero.
The Chinese team and the South Korean team will both make their World Cup debut on June 4. The Chinese team will face Costa Rica, its first opponent in the group stage. The match will be at 13:30 Seoul time.
South Korea's first opponent is Poland, and the match will be at 18:30 Seoul time. Liao Yu plans to return home after watching the first match of the Chinese team.
It was the first time for Jin Hengzhu to visit Song Yi's home. He liked the lawn garden outside the villa very much. "If I had known, I would have brought the golf clubs my brother-in-law gave me. I could have putted a few shots on the lawn when I had nothing to do." Jin Hengzhu said with some regret.
Song Yi is quite nice to his brother-in-law Kim Hyung Soo, even though he abducted Kim Hyung Soo's two sisters.
"That's no big deal. There are several sets of golf clubs in the villa. Let Taixi take you there to try them out later. If you find that set of golf clubs more convenient to use, I'll give you another set." Song Yi was very generous.
Liao Yu compared the villa in Lijing Garden and the villa in Chengbeidong. The garden areas of the two villas are actually similar, but the privacy and security of Song Yi's villa in Chengbeidong are better than those in Lijing Garden.
There is a parking lot below the villa's lawn courtyard, and together with the courtyard's own wall, the villa's wall is about six or seven meters above the road. Without special tools, thieves cannot climb in at all.
As an investor of Hikvision, Song Yi has set up a strict security monitoring system in every corner of the villa. Once a stranger enters by mistake, the alarm system will immediately notify the security personnel. The security level of Song Yi's villa in Seongbuk-dong is comparable to that of the embassy residences of some small countries in Seongbuk-dong.
"It's a pity that Miaomiao didn't make many friends in Seoul, otherwise she would definitely be willing to come and stay with you for a while. She likes to run around on the lawn and is very energetic." Liao Yu said.
"How could that be? Brother Zaican's daughter is only a few years older than our Miaomiao. Miaomiao can still play with Sister Xu Zhuxian." Song Yi hasn't seen his niece Song Miao for half a year, and he misses her very much.
"Who is Xu Zhuxian?" Liao Yu heard this name for the first time and was a little confused.
"Xu Zhuxian is a kid OPPA met in Korea. She's now a trainee at SM Entertainment, so she can be considered a close friend of OPPA regardless of age difference." Kim Tae-hee introduced to Liao Yu how Song Yi knew Xu Zhuxian.
Liao Yu didn't understand Song Yi's approach. "Since you think so highly of Xu Zhuxian, why don't you sign Xu Zhuxian to New Asia?"
Song Yi smiled and did not directly answer Liao Yu's question. As a reborn person, he has an inexplicable obsession with Girls' Generation and Tara. When all the members of Girls' Generation become adults, he plans to say the classic saying to all the members of Girls' Generation, "I'm going to beat nine of them." Of course, he couldn't tell the truth to Liao Yu, otherwise he would be beaten in bed. In June, the Jin Xiyuan sisters and Liao Yu formed a sister group, and the three of them went shopping in major stores in Seoul. Later, Chen Zaican's Cui Shanji and Cha Tae-hyun's girlfriend Cui Xien also joined in.
Choi Seon, who joined last, joked with the rest of the sisters, "Every time there's a World Cup, I feel like I've suddenly broken up. I really don't understand what's so good about football, 22 men on the field fighting for a ball, we have two balls, and we don't even have to fight for them, and yet they still don't care."
Cui Shanji originally wanted to invite Song Yi to her house to watch football, and then have him dribble her ball. However, Song Yi suddenly turned into a gentleman, which made her very uncomfortable.
When Chen Zaican, this spineless guy, heard that Song Yi had prepared several large-screen monitors in the office to broadcast the World Cup matches live, he ran to the New Asia Building to report in every day without fail.
"Sian, you're still lucky. At least after the World Cup, Taehyun will come back to you and end your single life. Unlike us, it's the same whether we have a husband or not, whether there is a World Cup or not." Choi Sun-hee couldn't help but complain.
Liao Yu listened to the conversation between Luo Xien and Cui Shanji, thinking deeply. Marriage is like a besieged city, people inside want to get out, and people outside want to get in.
Luo Xien and Cha Tae-hyun are still working hard to buy their first apartment in Seoul, while Chen Jae-chan and his wife have achieved financial freedom in their thirties.
Although her boyfriend Cha Tae-hyun is a popular male star in South Korea, Luo Xien is the poorest among the five sisters. If Choi Sun-hee is mainly shopping and supplemented by shopping, then she is mainly shopping and supplemented by shopping. However, Luo Xien has a good aesthetic vision and has always been helping Choi Sun-hee and others with advice.
Luo Xien had hosted Song Yi at home, and Cha Tae-hyun had asked Song Yi for help with Kim Jong-kook's matter. Before Song Yi could do anything, Kim Kwang-soo wisely stopped making things difficult for Kim Jong-kook.
Through this incident, Luo Xien directly felt Song Yi's power in the Korean entertainment industry, and she has been reminding Cha Tae-hyun and Song Yi to maintain a good relationship.
Cha Tae-hyun and Song Yi are of the same age, but there is a huge difference in their status, and Cha Tae-hyun doesn't know how to make friends with Song Yi.
Song Yi asked Cha Tae-hyun to play golf, but Cha Tae-hyun was not very good at golf and he could not afford the huge expense of frequent golf courses. The annual membership fee for a top golf club in Seoul is as high as hundreds of millions of won, not including the purchase of golf equipment and tips for caddies.
The Dragon Year Club composed of Cha Tae-hyun, Kim Jong-kook and Jang Hyuk also invited Song Yi to play football together, but Song Yi often flew back and forth between China and South Korea, and it was difficult to find a suitable time.
However, this World Cup has brought new ideas to Cha Tae-hyun, and he has set his sights on Kim Tae-hee's younger brother, Kim Hyung-soo. Kim Hyung-soo will come to Seoul to study at university next year, and if Kim Hyung-soo replaces Song Yi to participate in the Dragon Year Club's football match, then Cha Tae-hyun and Kim Jong-kook can maintain this personal relationship with Song Yi.
Cui Xien certainly agreed with her boyfriend's decision. She joined the sister shopping group organized by Jin Xiyuan and her sister for her boyfriend's career. At any time, the wife route is quite useful.
While the sisters were busy shopping, Song Yi and his team were busy watching the game in the office. All Korean companies under the New Asia Group issued an administrative notice that as long as there was a Korean team game on that day, all employees in the company could leave work two hours before the game started, so that they could rush to the stadium or home to watch the game.
Not only that, the restaurant and cafe on the first floor of the New Asia Building are equipped with TV screens to facilitate fans to watch the World Cup.
The employees of Xinya posted this administrative notice on inschool. The male employees of other companies in Seoul were collectively shocked. They forwarded this administrative notice to inschool’s personal homepage and @ed their own bosses, hoping that they could learn more from Song Yi, a good boss.
However, Liao Yu could not help teasing Song Yi that he was just putting on a show. Otherwise, why didn't Song Yi treat everyone equally and give the employees of Xinya's mainland companies half a day off to let them go home and watch the game. After all, this was the first time that the Chinese team entered the World Cup.
"As the host country, the South Korean team usually schedules its games in the evening for the sake of ratings. The game time is basically 18:30 Seoul time. Even if I let them go two hours early, it won't affect their work."
"But the Chinese team's games are all scheduled for 1:30 p.m. If I let them go home to watch the games, basically the entire afternoon will be wasted. I'm an entrepreneur, not a philanthropist. At most, they can take leave to watch the games, and I'll count them as full attendance." Song Yi knew everything clearly.
"No wonder others say that employees may make a small profit, but capitalists never lose money. You use your employees to build your image as a good boss, and at the same time make your employees grateful to you. You always like to play this trick of killing two birds with one stone." Liao Yu hinted at something.
Song Yi immediately became alert. He didn't know whether Liao Yu's words were unintentional or deliberate. Liao Yu had only come into contact with Kim Tae Hee before. Maybe she had guessed through daily contact in the past two days that Kim Hee Won and Choi Sun Hee had an ambiguous relationship with him. So, when Liao Yu said "killing two birds with one stone", did she mean the sisters Kim Hee Won and Kim Tae Hee, or Kim Hee Won and Choi Sun Hee? As a man, Song Yi actually didn't like his women to be too close to each other, because it was easy for women to form an offensive and defensive alliance together to deal with him as a man. For example, Jun Ji Hyun and Song Hye Kyo would compete for Song Yi's favor, but in order to fight against the Kim Tae Hee sisters, they would occasionally serve Song Yi together.
For most Korean men, dating either Jun Ji-hyun or Song Hye-kyo is already a great fortune. And Song Yi, who can play games with both Jun Ji-hyun and Song Hye-kyo at the same time, is simply the ultimate dream of Korean men.
Song Yi felt a little guilty, he knew that he had neglected Liao Yu in the first half of the year, and the two of them had met very few times. If Liao Yu had not focused on her daughter Song Miao, Liao Yu might have dumped Song Yi long ago.
The reason why he invited Liao Yu to Seoul was to have some intimacy with Liao Yu. But Liao Yu had been sleeping in the same bed with Kim Tae Hee these days. Liao Yu also taught Kim Tae Hee a lot of ways to restrain Song Yi. Kim Tae Hee's eyes lit up when she heard this, and she immediately regarded Liao Yu as a confidant.
Song Yi didn't buy any matches in the past two days. Among the matches in the first three days of June, he only remembered that Germany defeated Saudi Arabia 8-0, so he started betting on the first game of the World Cup.
He didn't bet on the score. If Song Yi really spent millions of dollars to bet on a score of 8 to 0, the bookmaker would definitely take action to influence the final result of the game in order not to pay Song Yi's bet. Either the score would be fixed at 7 to 0, or it would become 6 to 1 or something like that.
Song Yi bet that Germany would win by more than 5 goals against Saudi Arabia, which was not a particularly high odds. Song Yi tried his hand at betting, betting $500,000 to test the waters, but the final score was still 8 to 0. Obviously, the bookmaker did not care about the few million dollars Song Yi earned.
Of course, several million dollars are not much for Song Yi, who is worth $1 billion, but Song Yi, who made the money, was still generous enough to give shopping funds to Liao Yu, Kim Tae-hee and Kim Hee-won.
Song Yi also assigned the three of them a task, asking them to consider from the perspective of consumers how Sohan.com, as a shopping website, could beat offline physical retail stores in addition to price advantages. Moreover, Liao Yu and her friends often patronized luxury brand stores, and it was easy to buy fakes when shopping online.
As Song Yi's woman, Liao Yu certainly had no pressure to spend Song Yi's money. She also bought a lot of gifts for her parents-in-law and daughter to take back to Yanjing.
Song Yi knew that Liao Yu had booked a flight back home on the morning of the 5th, and she could still stay in Seoul for two nights.
"Liao Yu, why don't you not sleep in the same room with Taixi tonight? After Taixi falls asleep, I will go to your room." Song Yi took the initiative to speak.
Liao Yu snorted, "President Song, haven't you been able to fall asleep peacefully with a football in your arms these days? Tae Hee and Hyung Soo are both in the villa, and you dare to touch my room. If Tae Hee finds out about the two of us, should I jump into the Han River to prove my innocence?"
Song Yi thought about it and said, "It's okay. I'll call Xiyuan over and ask her to accompany Taixi. With Xiyuan covering for me, Taixi will definitely not notice it."
Liao Yu found that she had underestimated Song Yi's shamelessness. "So you only plan to avoid Taixi, and you will not pretend to be anything when it comes to Xiyuan. What will you do if Xiyuan finds out?"
Song Yi thought that Xiyuan and Liaoyu were both his women now. Xiyuan had previously expressed her intention to serve Song Yi together with her sister Kim Tae-hee. Tae-hee was out of luck for the time being, so would Xiyuan be willing to play three-person Landlord with Liaoyu?
"Liao Yu, in fact, Taixi has been praising you to me these past two days, saying that you are like another sister to her. If Xiyuan finds out about us, I will drag her down with me, and then I will let Xiyuan learn what it means to kill two birds with one stone." Song Yi said. (End of this chapter)