The father had already left St. Petersburg and returned home by plane, leaving Chen Yingxiong alone.
So how did he feel about the single life he had longed for? If you asked Chen Yingxiong this question now, he would definitely spit on the ground, "Out of the frying pan and into the fire."
This was his current situation.
I thought that now that my father was gone, I could be free. Just like those professional players, I could rent a house in the most prosperous downtown area of St. Petersburg, and after training every day, I could linger in the lively nightlife of St. Petersburg, chat with those sexy Russian beauties, and get lucky with my status as a local professional player.
Who would have thought that he was now trapped in the Youdeni Park training base in the northeast of St. Petersburg - considering that he was only eighteen years old, the club did not find a house for him outside, but let him live in the team's youth team dormitory.
Living in this natural forest park some distance from downtown St. Petersburg, surrounded by towering fir trees... It is eerily quiet at night, except for the whistling wind and the occasional howling of wild animals.
Chen Yingxiong, who lacked transportation, could only look towards downtown St. Petersburg every night with tears streaming down his face - when would this miserable life end?
The evenings were really hard for Chen Yingxiong. He didn't speak the language, and when he watched TV, all the programs were in Russian. He didn't have a computer, so he couldn't even play games online, otherwise he would have spent the evenings playing World of Warcraft...
World of Warcraft, produced by the famous game company Blizzard Entertainment, was officially launched in China at the end of April this year. Before he was terminated by the club, he had locked himself in his room and played this game like crazy. He applied for a public beta account and trained a dwarf warrior. Chen Yingxiong, who was over 1.9 meters tall, chose the shortest race in the game.
He rushed to level 45 at the fastest speed - the maximum level in the public beta was level 45 at that time - and became one of the first players in the server to reach the maximum level. After reaching the maximum level, he took advantage of the fact that others were still struggling to level up and went to the Burning Plains and the Scorching Canyon to mine and collect herbs, and sell them at the auction house. Since he was the only one who could get such high-grade materials, he almost monopolized the alliance's auction house. He could set any price he wanted, and no matter whether others could accept it or not, they had to buy his materials. He soon made a fortune.
In addition to making money by collecting, he also went with his guild friends to challenge the princess of Maraudon. At that time, Maraudon was equivalent to the later RAID-level copy... Chen Yingxiong vented his depression from the real world into the game. In the real world, he became a loser who was terminated by the club, and in the game, he could be a winner. If he couldn't be a hero on the court in the real world, he would be a Warcraft hero in the continent of Azeroth!
Later, when World of Warcraft began to charge, he quickly became the first player on the server to reach level 60 and continued his career of making money by mining and collecting herbs. In addition, he worked day and night with the guild in five-man dungeons and team dungeons.
Blackrock Spire, Blackrock Depths, Stratholme, Scholomance, Dire Maul... These dungeons all held his footprints.
It was not until his father brought him to Europe that he ended his crazy online gaming career.
Now the pink-haired doll-headed dwarf-hero warrior named "Hero, I'm Afraid of No One" was still parked at the bridge of the auction house in Ironforge. Wearing courageous armour, carrying a dragon shield, and holding the Ironbone Sword dropped from Stratholme, his appearance was very cool. No one in their guild knew that the crazy main tank in their guild was actually a professional football player, so when Chen Yingxiong suddenly disappeared, there was a period of chaos in the guild. It even caused a split... Of course, Chen Yingxiong didn't know any of this.
The days without the internet, computers, only with TV programs that were incomprehensible were indeed difficult. Many nights, Chen Yingxiong lay alone in bed, staring at the ceiling in a daze. He even felt that the training during the day made him look forward to it more. At least he had something to do at that time. Once the night came, he had nothing to do, and the time was unbearable, and every second felt like a year.
A few days passed like this, and he found himself missing home...
Originally, he thought he wouldn't miss home. He had finally gotten so far away from home. What was wrong with being free? Why would he miss home?
But now, the homesickness was really lingering in him. During the day, he could relieve this emotion by completing the difficult training courses in the team, and he had no time to think about home. But at night, when he was the only one left in the dormitory, he couldn't watch TV, there was no computer or Internet, and he could only stare at his phone in a daze... That was when the feeling of homesickness really came out.
He missed the delicious food his mother cooked, his silent father, his own heated little house, his computer, the gnome-hermit warrior in World of Warcraft, the snacks, hotpot, and skewers from his hometown, and even Chinese - here, he could only speak English, he couldn't speak Russian yet, and no one would understand him even if he spoke Chinese.
He felt lonely.
…
Chen Yingxiong had been training in the youth team. Although he signed a professional contract, the club still treated him as a youth team player.
After all, he had just turned 18 years old - his birthday was May 25, 1988.
Chen Yingxiong, who was being coached by Popovich in the youth team, was still trying to adapt to his living environment and his teammates.
What he didn't know was that Zenit St. Petersburg had undergone a huge change during this period - the assistant coach Vladimir Borovikia, who had previously made the decision to sign him, had left the team. The reason for his departure was that his immediate superior, head coach Vlastimir Petzera, was fired by the club due to a conflict with the top management. As someone brought in by Petzera, he naturally couldn't stay in the club after Petzera left.
That was because the new head coach Advocaat also brought his own assistant coach, the Dutchman Porter.
Chen Yingxiong didn't know about this matter, so naturally, he didn't know what impact this matter might have on his future.
…
What is the first major job a new head coach will do when he comes to a team and starts coaching?
Without a doubt, it is to build his own prestige in the team.
Cleansing and introduction have become the two main themes. Although the Russian league is still ongoing, the European continent is still in the preparation stage for the new season - the Russian league is different from the mainstream European leagues. Due to weather reasons, the Russian football league does not cross the New Year but runs from March to November every year. Therefore, there is no XX/XX season here, only XX season. This year is the 2006 season, while most other leagues in the European continent are in the 06/07 season.
As soon as Advocaat came to the team, he brought three of his disciples from when he was coaching the South Korean national team - the young South Korean midfield genius Lee Ho, the left back Kim Dong-Jin who was in his prime, and the versatile midfielder Hyun Young-Min.
Korean players seemed to particularly like relying on their national team coaches to go abroad. After Hiddink led the Korean team to a historic World Cup semi-final, he took Park Ji-sung and Lee Young-Pyo, two of the Korean national team's top players, with him when he went to coach PSV Eindhoven.
With the arrival of Advocaat, Korean elements suddenly became stronger in the Zenit St. Petersburg team, which previously had nothing to do with South Korea.
The number of Korean journalists coming here to interview players also increased suddenly.
As a 21-year-old international player, Lee Ho had already played in the 2006 World Cup and was hailed as a genius and the hope of Korean football.
With this momentum, he joined Zenit St. Petersburg after this year's World Cup.
For a time, he became a leader among young Asian players and made the Korean media proud.
As for Chen Yingxiong, he had been in the team for almost two weeks.
Although he trained with the youth team every week, he had never participated in any official game of the youth team.
The club had said they would find him a translator and a language teacher, but nothing happened. The club had just changed its manager and was still in a turbulent period. There was no one to do many things, and the handover was not smooth. So this "youth player" who was signed a few days before Petzera and Borovekia left seemed to be forgotten and stayed in the youth team...
It wasn't until Advocaat found himself with three Koreans that the first-team squad became a little bloated, and he decided to clean out some players.
Because he took over the team's coaching position in the middle of the summer transfer window, he needed to know what signings his predecessor had made, so he asked the club for an overview of the team's transfer situation this summer.
He wanted to see what kind of people his predecessor had bought, and whether what he left behind was wealth or garbage...
When he got the list, he found that his predecessor seemed to have no intention of recruiting players. Just as the media said, all his energy during that period was spent on quarrelling with the top management.
In the transfer column, there are only two names...
And they were both forwards.
One was called Fatih Tekke and the other was of course, Hero Chen.
The first one is Turkish, and the second one is... Chinese!
Chinese?
Advocaat was stunned for a moment. Since he had coached the South Korean team before, he was not unfamiliar with Chinese football.
He was well aware that there were no players in the Chinese national team who played in the Russian league, otherwise he would have known it long before.
And based on his understanding of East Asians, Chinese names are rarely spelt and pronounced this way.
He knows the English meaning of Hero, but he has no idea what it means in China.
He suddenly developed a strong interest in this Chinese player with a strange name.
"Is there any information about this person?" he asked the team coach Nikolay Vorobjov, who gave him the list.
Virobchov glanced at the person pointed out by Advocaat on the list and smiled playfully.
When Advocaat saw his smile, he became even more curious.
He wanted to see more and more what kind of player this was.
…
At the coaching meeting every Monday morning, Kennedy Popovich met the team's new head coach again. This was the second time they met.
The first time was when Advocat had just taken office. All the coaches gathered to welcome the new head coach and let him get to know the people so that they could cooperate with him.
"Good morning, Mr. Popovich." Advocat greeted Popovich in fluent Russian.
"Good morning, Mr. Advocaat." Popovich had been quite respectful when seeing his immediate superior. Now that they were not familiar with each other, he should be a little more restrained.
"Is the work of the youth team going well?" Advocaat asked Popovich about his work situation in a friendly manner.
"Fine."
"I heard that your team signed a new player more than two weeks ago?" Without much nonsense, Advocat got straight to the point.
After Petzela and Borovickia left the team, Popovich once thought that Chen Yingxiong's luck was really bad - generally speaking, coaches who sign the players will value them more. So Borovickia should be very concerned about Chen Yingxiong. With the departure of Borovickia and Petzela, Chen Yingxiong suddenly became unpopular in the youth team.
What made Popovich happy was that Chen Yingxiong, who was ignored, worked very hard and seriously in the training, and did not show any impatience or worry about his future. Should we say that he was confident enough in himself, or that he had no idea about his possible future fate?
Now that Advocaat has taken the initiative to ask Chen Yingxiong, Popovich doesn't know what kind of changes this will bring to Chen Yingxiong.
"You mean Hero, Mr. Advocaat?"
"Hero?" Advocat noticed that Popovich also used the English word "Hero" when he mentioned the Chinese name, which was the same as what the Chinese person wrote on the list. But he had already asked Virobchov and knew that the Chinese person's name was "Yingxiong Chen."
"Yes, Hero." Popovich nodded in response.
"Shouldn't he be called 'Yingxiong Chen'?" Advocat felt strange.
Popovich explained with a smile. "His Chinese name is 'Yingxiong Chen', but he said his name 'Yingxiong' means 'Hero', so it is written like this. We usually call him Hero. To be honest, it is much smoother to call him this than Yingxiong..." Popovich still has difficulty pronouncing "Yingxiong".
Advocat suddenly realized that this was the case.
"It is said that it was the former assistant coach who decided to sign him?"
Popovich nodded: "Yes."
"It is said that he also beat the main defence of the youth team in the test?"
As soon as this topic was mentioned, Popovich's expression immediately became unnatural. This matter has spread throughout the club...
"Oh, yes, yes," he admitted.
After a week of training, he has fully witnessed Chen Yingxiong's ability in heading, which was indeed outstanding. He had demonstrated the ability he showed in the last test more than once in training.
"I heard that everyone was assigned to guard him, and even fouls were allowed and encouraged?" Advocaat asked.
Assistant coach Coul Porter, who had been listening and not speaking, couldn't help laughing when he heard this. Although he quickly stopped laughing, it still caused Popovich's dissatisfaction.
He knew what the new assistant coach's laughter meant. Either he didn't believe in Chen Yingxiong's ability, or he was mocking his youth team - even pulling and fouling were used, but he still couldn't stop one person. It was really embarrassing.
But after seeing Chen Yingxiong's header ability in training, Popovich no longer felt as bothered by it as before, because he believed that Chen Yingxiong really had the ability to break through the siege.
He glanced at Porter, then nodded to Advocaat. "Yes, we used fouls. Two players pulled his clothes from behind, and two other players jumped up to compete with him for the header. Two players intercepted him from the front and one interfered from the side. But he still scored a goal. It was because of this goal that the then assistant coach Mr. Borovikia decided to sign him."
He simply said it out loud, he no longer felt ashamed. As for whether the two newcomers believed it or not, that was their business.
…
After Popovich left, Porter couldn't wait to express his opinion on the matter. "I think the youth training director is exaggerating, Dick!"
Advocaat frowned, also wondering how credible this "story" was.
"I've seen many excellent players, but none of them can do this... One person is surrounded by five people, two are pulling him back, two are blocking him from the front, and one is interfering from the side, and he can still score a goal... Is he an alien!"
"No matter if you analyze this matter based on common sense, logic, or experience, it doesn't make sense!"
Advocaat asked in return. "If it was fake, then why did Zenit St. Petersburg sign him?"
Porter replied. "I don't deny that this Chinese player may have some qualities that Zenit values, but it is definitely not as exaggerated as they say!"
Advocaat also felt that what his assistant said made sense. To be honest, the "story" that Popovich and Verobuchov told was too horrifying. How could such a thing happen on the court? Unless Chen Yingxiong was a giant who was over two meters tall and weighed over a hundred kilograms, and his opponents were all ten-year-old children...
"Well...anyway. We are new to this team, and there are many situations we are not familiar with. I think it is better to be cautious. Seeing is believing."
"You plan to go and see his training in person?"
"I'm afraid I don't have the time, but I remember there was a youth league game on Sunday, the day after our home game..."