Chapter 715: Unable to hide the embarrassment
The O2 Arena, formerly the North Greenwich Arena nicknamed the "Millennium Dome", is located on the Greenwich Peninsula on the Thames in northeast London.
It was one of the earliest buildings that successfully attracted global attention among a series of millennium buildings built by countries around the world to welcome the arrival of the 21st century.
The entire project was originally considered to be temporary, but after investigation and research, it was found that this project had great value both for the revitalization of the surrounding urban areas and for long-term investment in building transportation infrastructure, so the temporary project evolved into a formal project.
The building was officially unveiled and put into use on December 31, 1999. Due to its unique shape and magnificent style, it has attracted widespread attention and has been listed as one of the most important buildings in the 1990s by many architectural magazines, earning it the title of "Pearl of London".
In 2007, the venue was officially opened to the public on a daily basis, bidding farewell to the commemorative name "Millennium Dome" and becoming more and more known as the O2 Arena.
The O2 Arena has always been a popular venue for various sporting events and concerts. In 2012, in order to welcome the Olympic Games, the stadium was renovated and a batch of new equipment was replaced, which made the venue even more popular, and countless events are held all year round.
Exactly five years ago in 2009, the ATP moved the year-end finals to London, and the O2 Arena has been the venue since then, and it continues to this day.
After Paris, London has become another city to host two top ATP events: one is Wimbledon, the oldest Grand Slam.
The second is the year-end finals, the annual Huashan Sword Contest.
For male professional tennis players, the cities of London and Paris have become particularly special.
Whether you admit it or not, London has always been a football city. The bars, streets, schools and buses are all filled with the atmosphere of football, which is deeply imprinted in the blood of the city. Every weekend, the city is boiling with football, and people pour countless enthusiasm into it.
Compared to football, tennis is naturally less popular.
It is also because of this that when the ATP year-end finals first came to London, the attendance did not meet expectations, which was undoubtedly disappointing.
However, after five years of in-depth market promotion and cultivation, the popularity of the year-end finals has been rising steadily, and this year has ushered in an unprecedented blowout -
The attendance rate broke the record of the year-end finals!
Moreover, in addition to the spectators who buy tickets to enter, the O2 Arena’s endless stream of enthusiastic crowds every day also unleashes incredible energy.
Every day, there is always a long queue in front of the training ground entrance. Although they know that there are only a hundred spots for free admission to watch training, the queues waiting incessantly seem to have no end, and can even connect one training ground to another like a domino chain.
The number of fans waiting in the hotel lobby also reached a new high.
Every time the ATP officially organizes a fan interaction event, inviting two finals players to come and interact with fans face to face, it is foreseeable that the number of registrations will explode; and the number of fans who are not qualified to enter but still come to watch on site is considerable.
From the moment you step out of the subway station, you can deeply feel the enthusiasm in the air.
The journalists from all over the world who came to London to report on the year-end finals all lamented that the atmosphere at the O2 Stadium this year was really hot, comparable to a carnival. Even the experienced journalists exclaimed repeatedly,
"Never experienced that before."
Literally, it set the entire market off.
After just two days of competition, The Times couldn't wait to announce: "This is the most successful year-end final in history."
In fact, as the host country, "The Times" naturally praised the team highly; moreover, they have always had the habit of exaggerating and boasting. Keywords such as "the strongest in history", "the best in the past decade" and "the most successful in the past thirty years" are common, especially in the years when the World Cup is held.
But this time, The Times is not the only media outlet that thinks so. Similar views are unanimously recognized by many different media outlets on five continents.
Judging from the market enthusiasm, this year's year-end finals is indeed making history, expanding its influence step by step and striving to catch up with the Grand Slam.
Success, there is no doubt about it.
However, life is never that simple, and judging the pros and cons of a thing is not that rough. Reality is often much more complicated.
In sharp contrast to the heated atmosphere, the group matches were boring, one-sided and drowsy and could not be called exciting at all.
Unable to hide the embarrassment.
Competitive sports, after all, are about looking forward to exciting, bloody duels. A resounding victory is certainly gratifying, but it is the ups and downs and suspenseful battles that can really make people's blood boil and vividly interpret the meaning of "higher, faster and farther".
Why did this year's year-end finals create a new record? Why did it trigger such a frenzy? Why did it ignite such an atmosphere? Fresh blood! Kei Nishikori, who represents Asian faces, and Milos Raonic, who represents the new generation, joined hands to step onto the stage of the O2 Arena for the first time.
The four Grand Slams belong to four players respectively; in addition, Wawrinka, Tsonga and Koeman also won the Masters respectively.
In addition, the topic of "the collapse of the Big Four era" has been pushed to a climax step by step since the Australian Open at the beginning of the year to the end of the year; the competition for a place in the year-end finals continued until the semi-finals of the Paris Masters, with one head-to-head and close battle after another.
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All aspects prove one thing:
Perhaps, the year-end finals may turn into a mess.
In fact, the year-end finals have not seen any waves for a long, long time. The last time there was an "accident" was when it first came to the O2 Arena in 2009.
That year, Davydenko and Del Potro unexpectedly reached the final, and Davydenko eventually won the championship.
In the next four years, Federer won two consecutive championships and Djokovic won two consecutive championships. It was very difficult for other players to even make it to the finals. Only Tsonga made it to the final once in 2011. The runners-up in the other three finals were Nadal, Federer, and Nadal.
...nothing new.
It’s not that people don’t like the Big Four - quite the opposite, the Big Four undoubtedly have the largest fan base; it’s that people expect surprises and changes.
It is precisely because of this that, after experiencing such a magical and crazy year, people have reason to have more expectations for the year-end finals: regardless of what the lineups for the semi-finals or finals will be like, at least the group stage matchups should be more exciting, right?
Look, last week in Paris, Gawain upset Djokovic, Raonic upset Federer, and Anderson upset Wawrinka. The top three seeds all lost. So in London, shouldn't the competition be even more intense and closer?
However, the reality is——
(End of this chapter)