161 Riyadh World Games-Mixed Doubles
◎Then let’s make the curtain call perfect as well.◎
The mixed doubles competition lasted for three days. When it came to the quarter-finals, Zhu Qi and Song Linzhou quickly won the game in fifteen minutes.
By the middle of the fight, the Japanese team had given up resistance.
Although Haraka is not that good, she is still a pretty good player trained by the Japanese team over a long period of time.
Not to mention the Little Cannon and Reiko Komatsu who had never defeated Zhu Qi and Song Linzhou before.
The entire mixed doubles match was a feast for the eyes for the coaches in the audience.
This is no longer simply a table tennis game, but more like two warriors who cooperate well with each other competing with swords on the court. With every swing of the racket, you can hear the rustling sound of the racket cutting through the air, which makes everyone's eardrums itch.
Although Xu Dong, the off-court coach of mixed doubles, has been working non-stop recently, she is much more proficient than when she first led Zhu Qi to compete in the World Games.
Thinking back to the past.
When Xu Dong participated in the Tokyo World Games for the first time, she was even more excited than Zhu Qi. When she arrived in Tokyo, she even couldn't sleep for three consecutive nights. Later, it was Zhu Qi who comforted her and asked her to relax. Then the two of them talked for a long time.
This is Zhu Qi's third time participating in the World Games, and also Xu Dong's third time.
They all gradually caught up with the pace of the World Games and became very proficient. Many times, when they were standing on the sidelines giving tactical instructions, they could understand each other's thoughts with just one sentence.
After the quarter-finals and semi-finals, the two players from the Japanese team felt a little disappointed, but it was also expected.
Although there is no chance of getting first or second place, we can still compete for the bronze medal.
The other half of the draw will feature the Hong Kong mixed doubles team.
In the last World Games, Hong Kong team's Mori Yunan and Huang Jiajia only made it to the quarterfinals. This time, they were able to win consecutive games and reach the finals from the other half of their group. For the Hong Kong team, this is already a very good result.
Mori Yunan and Huang Jiajia had a tough match. Zhu Qi and Song Linzhou left work early and changed their clothes before coming out. The semi-finals in the other half of the zone had not yet finished.
It was the North Korean team that fought with the Hong Kong team until the seventh game.
This time it was still Xi Lingen and her former partner Song Shuibo.
Song Shuibo's "violin" racket also caused trouble for the Qilin group before. This special racket is very difficult for those who are not familiar with it to play against each other.
Fortunately, the Hong Kong team arranged Huang Jiajia to receive the ball from Song Shuibo, and Huang Jiajia is a well-known "lifting machine" and a master of chopping the ball. As long as the ball is not particularly powerful, he can basically lift it.
Xi Ling'en feels that after the wrist surgery, his condition has improved to a certain extent compared to before, and he is not as aggressive in playing.
Because the Qilin group got off work early today, the host of the sports channel saw that they still had plenty of time, so he went to watch the game next door.
After all, there is the Hong Kong team next door, and they are also members of the Chinese team.
After watching for a while, even the commentator noticed this and began analyzing some of Xi Ling'en's problems: "Actually, table tennis—despite the small court and the smaller running routes of the players, the actual running in table tennis is incredibly damaging to all aspects of the body. This is especially true of our old North Korean rival, the captain of the women's team, Xi Ling'en. Her style of play is incredibly damaging to the wrists, with every swing adding another level of strain. The human wrist is actually wrapped in a lot of soft tissue, which wears away with movement. Each time the wear is applied, the damage increases, and the wear continues... until all that soft tissue is worn away."
He Qianlu continued, "Yes, so I heard that Xi Ling'en went to Chaojing for wrist surgery last year. Gao Xiaofeng also had a similar procedure that year, which involved adding soft tissue fillers. But after all, it's not the body's original soft tissue, so it's definitely not as good as the body's own soft tissue. So we can see that Xi Ling'en is a little "constrained" in this competition."
The host was curious: [As an athlete, you must often find yourself feeling unwell but still have to compete. What do you usually do in such situations?]
"Of course, I just pushed through it," He Qianlu said. "Just like Zhu Qi, who had ankle ligament surgery before, and Qin Shang from the men's team, too. For athletes like us who rely on flexibility, when we were laying the foundation, I focused on their footwork. So often, the lower body has to move before the upper body has time to react, which can be very damaging to the ankle. If we have to play a match, there's definitely no time to adjust..."
What He Qianlu meant by this sentence is not just to say that athletes have a hard time. After all, every profession has its own difficulties.
But he also knows that as time goes by, many people will forget the athletes who once fought hard.
For example, myself.
When He Qianlu first played in the competition, televisions were not yet widely available in China. Many people could only listen to the games on the radio and could not even see the pictures.
At that time, many radio stations would broadcast the latest game progress in real time, such as who scored a point, who won a game, and who won the championship where.
Many people may not even know what He Qianlu looks like. It was only when He Qianlu got into trouble that everyone knew what he looked like through the newspapers.
He hopes that people whose economy has improved now can remember what Zhu Qi looked like, so that even after ten or twenty years, when they see Zhu Qi again, they will know how much Zhu Qi has contributed to the cause of table tennis.
In the end, the Hong Kong team narrowly defeated the North Korean team with a score of [4:3].
Tomorrow is the mixed doubles final and the bronze medal match between North Korea and Japan.
The entire Chinese team cheered.
Xu Dong and Gao Xiaofeng also watched the match between North Korea and Hong Kong from the sidelines, highly praising the synergy between Mori Yu-nan and Huang Jia-jia. Although pleased, Huang Jia-jia remained extremely vigilant. "Mori Yu-nan is playing very aggressively now. His style was very stable before, making it difficult to find fault with him. Now he's become even more aggressive in his shots. It seems like he's done research on the North Korean team. The North Korean mixed doubles team is most afraid of poor smashes in the middle."
Zhu Qi knew what Xu Dong meant. In fact, she and Song Linzhou also had a problem in their mixed doubles. Although they were both left-handed and right-handed, whenever they started running in an interlaced manner, there would be a brief half-step overlap.
At this time, the person standing behind will not be able to see the path and trajectory of the ball clearly.
They lost points several times because of this, so in order to make up for it, Xu Dong would deliberately arrange for them to practice hitting the ball at a large angle when moving when training them in mixed doubles, so that it would be difficult for the opponent to hit a straight ball along the center line.
But after watching the Hong Kong team's game just now, Zhu Qi saw that Huang Jiajia and Mori Yunan pulled the ball to Xi Ling'en's center line several times, preventing Xi Ling'en from playing freely.
"Huang Jiajia is a chopper and her chopping touch is amazing. It's easy for her to forcibly change the trajectory of the ball to chop the ball along the center line, so you must pay attention to your positioning tomorrow," Xu Dong said.
Zhu Qi nodded and walked towards the playing area carrying his golf bag.
I've played so many games over the years.
There were many difficult games and dangerous matches, but they fought through them all.
Song Linzhou couldn't remember how many games he had played with Zhu Qi, but every game was perfect.
Their original combination actually originated from Ren Xinhua's random pairing. Song Linzhou knew that a big part of the reason he was able to participate in the Tokyo World Games was that the team wanted to choose a mixed doubles partner for Zhu Qi, and he just happened to be suitable.
At that time, Song Linzhou was just a marginal figure in the team's absolute main force. He could not sit firmly in the absolute main force layer and would fall out if he was not careful.
Zhu Qi is already a world champion who joins the team with a medal.
It is impossible to say that there is no pressure when being Zhu Qi's mixed doubles partner.
Especially when he knew that Zhu Qi had extremely high requirements for choosing a partner, Song Linzhou treated training as a competition.
Then I would also quietly pay attention to Zhu Qi's training process. At that time, Zhu Qi had just joined the team and had a new coach. He was still in the running-in stage with Xu Dong.
But the witch of table tennis has already demonstrated her extraordinary talent. Xu Dong and her work together very efficiently. She can remember many training tasks as long as Xu Dong says them once.
At that time, mixed doubles had just been added to the World Games.
Many players in the team do not take mixed doubles seriously, especially the male players who think mixed doubles is difficult and stressful.
Some of the male players who were arranged by Ren Xinhua to practice mixed doubles with the female players were basically slacking off.
Only after Song Linzhou finished his training tasks every day, he would run to the edge of the women's team's training ground and wait.
Show up on time at the right time and place.
Even Fat Tiger, who was on the national team at the time, felt that Song Linzhou was taking it a bit too seriously, and jokingly said to him, "Is it really that serious? You're already exhausted from training on your own, and you're still training with this little Golden Throne for two hours alone? How do you have so much energy?"
At that time, there were still some veteran players in the men's team who had not retired. They looked at Zhu Qi like a little sister and thought that the newcomer was a little arrogant.
Although they joined the team with badges, many old players still like to use their seniority to bully the young players, thinking that who hasn't won a game or a championship?
Song Linzhou hadn't really thought much about it. He simply felt that Zhu Qi was a rare talent, and that sooner or later he would surpass everyone else. Since the coach had asked him to train with Zhu Qi, he considered it a way to contribute to a future Grand Slam and learn from him.
During practice, Song Linzhou discovered that Zhu Qi was indeed a novice in doubles. Often he would move without looking at his partner's position. This might be because he was used to playing singles and lacked the awareness of coordination in doubles.
That doesn’t matter. I have experience anyway, so I can actively cooperate with her and let her adapt to the rhythm of doubles as soon as possible.
As a result, we have been cooperating for ten years.
Time flies quickly.
In the blink of an eye, it was time for what might be their last world-class mixed doubles match.
That night, the coaches found all the Hong Kong team's game videos for them and asked them to watch and analyze them in order to prepare for tomorrow's final.
Although everyone has confidence in the Kirin group, we can't open the champagne in advance.
The two of them watched until eleven o'clock in the evening, and when they couldn't take it anymore, they prepared to go back to their suite to rest.
Standing in the hotel corridor, a very short path, the floor is covered with hand-woven carpets, and there is no sound when you walk on it.
There was silence on all sides.
Zhu Qi could hear the wind outside the window. He walked up the stairs and stopped by the window. Looking at the row of national flags erected outside, he felt a little emotional: "Sports competition is really the last pure land in this world. I hope that every competition in the future can be clean."
Song Linzhou thought she was talking about the emergence of athletes like Jamie, who disrupted the development space of normal athletes, and then said, "Yes, because many people will learn from your spirit..."
"My spirit?" Zhu Qi didn't know why he praised her like that. She didn't even know what spirit of hers was worth learning from. After all, she was an extreme hawk among the rabbits, and she had once advocated the idea of China's supremacy.
The lofty aspiration of liberating all mankind as expressed on Tiananmen Square cannot yet be fully realized.
To put it bluntly, I haven’t even taken care of my own family yet, so who has the energy to care about the lives of people outside?
but……
Sometimes when I see some poor small countries running to foreign countries in pursuit of their dreams, I feel that the global village cannot be just a slogan.
Song Linzhou's eyes were serious. "You've taken every step forward with down-to-earth determination, taking every match seriously and training every day with dedication. You've become an indispensable pillar of the national table tennis team. Everyone knows that since you joined the national team, the team's atmosphere has improved a lot, and this is all thanks to you. People like you are born to be at the top and influence others..."
Zhu Qi felt a little embarrassed. She didn't think she had such great power. After all, the Chinese table tennis team was able to safely survive the "dark twelve years" thanks to all the teammates who worked hard with her during this period.
"...Because you have also influenced me." Song Linzhou stretched out his hand and scratched his nose, feeling a little shy.
The tip of his left index finger is covered with a thick layer of calluses, which are the "results" of countless days and nights of hard training.
Zhu Qi was the first person to acknowledge his ability to play with a straight racket.
Looking at Song Linzhou's innocent eyes, and his straightforward look that seemed to show sincerity in his eyes, Zhu Qi smiled.
"Our mixed doubles team started with chance, so let's make this finale the best it can be."
"Yeah!" Song Linzhou nodded heavily.
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