Chapter 64: Masturbation

Nicola Ratish sat in the dugout, trying to look normal. The game had just begun, and he had already confirmed that Zenit St. Petersburg's No. 99 was the Chinese man who had disappeared from his sight pathetically all those months ago.

He didn't know what the Chinese father and son were called, but with their body shapes and heights, he couldn't mistake them.

He was really surprised. He thought he would never see that arrogant Chinese boy again in his life, but he didn't expect to meet him again so soon.

He also confirmed one thing: the other party obviously recognized him. Since he walked out of the player tunnel, the other party had been looking at him. That look was naked excitement.

What was he excited about?

Latish didn't understand.

Sitting next to him, head coach Gasaev, wearing a thick coat, was watching the game with his legs crossed.

The competition had just begun. Although there was still snow in the sky, the conditions were much better than in the morning.

However, there was still a lot of snow on the field.

The match ball was also replaced with a red football, making it easier for everyone to find the target in this white Russian world.

The TV commentator of the game complained at the beginning that Zenit was wearing white jerseys with only a little blue stripe, which was hard to see clearly on the court.

But he soon stopped complaining because when Chen Yingxiong slipped and fell to the ground, his buttocks were all black when he got up.

Now it was easy to tell!

Chen Yingxiong got up from the ground. He had just rushed forward, ready to receive the ball from his teammate, but his teammate passed the ball too far back, so he wanted to stop suddenly and turn back to receive it. This action was not difficult for him to do on a normal court, but today he made a fool of himself.

He sat down directly on the ground. The snow and pre-match warm-up activities turned the stadium into a rotten vegetable field.

Chen Yingxiong got up from the ground and patted his butt out of habit, but the more he patted, the dirtier it got. His hands were covered in mud and he couldn't shake it off.

Seeing that he couldn't get rid of it, Chen Yingxiong simply gave up.

Although he changed into long-spike shoes before the game, Chen Yingxiong was still not used to this kind of court.

Snow battles weren't as much fun as he had thought.

"Zenit's No. 99 player Hero started the game again. He hasn't scored in four consecutive league games and was even sent back to the bench once. If Tekke hadn't been injured again after just returning... he might not have been arranged to start this game..."

Yuri Petrov, the football commentator of Russia's first channel, was introducing Chen Yingxiong to the audience.

This was not the first time he had seen this player. He had introduced him in detail during the last match between Zenit and Spartak Moscow. But things were completely different back then. Chen Yingxiong was really popular at that time. He had just performed a hat trick in the match against Wings of the Soviet Union and became famous overnight. Everyone was very interested in this iron tower-like giant.

Who would have thought that the game was the beginning of Chen Yingxiong's low point.

His performance in the competition was quite poor, which greatly disappointed Yuri Petrov, who had had high hopes for him.

After that, he no longer paid attention to this Chinese person.

It was not until he was preparing for the commentary task of this game that he re-learned about Chen Yingxiong. After seeing that he had not scored a goal in four consecutive league games, he thought to himself. "Sure enough, this kid is just a shooting star..."

"...Due to his single characteristic, Hero is easily blocked by the opponent. This is also the reason why he has not scored a goal in the past four league games. In the last game, Advocaat seemed to use him as a tactical center forward...I wonder if this will provide him with more playing opportunities?"

Due to the slippery field, Chen Yingxiong's performance was greatly affected. It was not until the twelfth minute that he jumped for the first time.

The result was a high ball.

He already felt that, just like his previous opponents, CSKA Moscow's tactics against him were nothing new.

He had two central defenders double-teaming him in the middle, and one of them, who was the best at heading the ball, would stay close to him. They then strictly guarded against crosses from the wing, and tried to cut them off to prevent him from heading the ball into the goal. As for the long ball from the backcourt, the defense was not very strict - no one thought that Chen Yingxiong could jump up from outside the penalty area and rub the ball into the goal.

After four games, Chen Yingxiong was very familiar with this set. But what did it matter if he was familiar with it before? He had no other tricks. Apart from heading, he could do nothing else.

Even though he knew that it was futile and would definitely fail, he could only use his header to fight with the opponent.

But now it was different...

Ratish watched the game for more than ten minutes and found that Chen Yingxiong was not a threat at all. He now felt that he was right to let this person go. 

If such a person stayed in CSKA, he might not have even been able to play in the youth team.

Gasaev sat in the coaching booth, not moving at all. They were playing at home and were currently in an advantageous position, so he had nothing to worry about.

Advocaat frowned.

The poor field made it impossible to carry out ground cooperation, and the dribbling effectiveness of Arshavin, Kerzakov, and others was also greatly reduced.

He turned his eyes to Chen Yingxiong. It seemed that he still had to count on him.

Before the game, Advocaat gave Chen Yingxiong the task of being a qualified receiver and bridgehead. When the attack reached him, he would pass the ball to his teammates.

Because of Chen Yingxiong, the team had the advantage of high altitude and could lift the football.

But in this case, Chen Yingxiong's probability of scoring a goal was very low... because he needed to pass the ball to his teammates instead of letting his teammates pass the ball to him.

Unexpectedly, Chen Yingxiong himself did not raise any objection to this arrangement.

This also made him feel a little relieved.

After all, the team's victory was more important.

"That Chen Yingxiong's performance is as poor as ever..." The reporters in the media seats were commenting on the game that had just lasted for more than ten minutes.

"The venue is a bit bad…"

"What does it have to do with the field? He is an excellent header player, his advantages are all in the air. And the field is so bad, it has strengthened Zenit's determination to play high balls. His teammates are passing the ball to him, so he should have more opportunities to play!"

"Anyway, I don't have much hope for his performance in this game. You know, the field is bad, so Zenit will definitely play high balls, which will make it easier for CSKA to defend - if the field is normal, they will have to distract themselves to defend the lower three roads, but now they don't have to. They just need to defend in the air!"

The central figure of their discussion was still Chen Yingxiong, because Chen Yingxiong's attitude during interviews after getting off the bus angered the media.

He held his head high and looked down at the group of reporters in front of him with the corner of his eyes, making those uncrowned kings feel like dwarfs begging for attention.

The media in St. Petersburg had now gradually become accustomed to Chen Yingxiong's style, but those in Moscow were still not quite clear about Hero's way of doing things.

Therefore, few media from St. Petersburg participated in this discussion, and it was the media from Moscow that were indignant.

But when they were competing to express their disdain for Chen Yingxiong, they all forgot that they had unknowingly made Chen Yingxiong the center of their hearts, and all their joys, sorrows, anger, and happiness revolved around Chen Yingxiong.

Chen Yingxiong found that the poor field allowed the team to focus on the air, which in turn helped reduce the burden on CSKA - they did not have to defend against the ground breakthroughs of Arshavin, Kerzakov, Anyukov, and others, they only needed to jump up and fight with one person.

Hero was under a lot of pressure right now.

It seemed that it was difficult to score a goal with his head at the moment.

He thus decided to try a long shot.

He had very little time left. Originally there were only forty-five minutes, and now another fifteen minutes had passed, leaving him half an hour. He had to score at least one goal in this half hour.

Chen Yingxiong passed the ball from the backcourt to Kerzakov who was not far away from him.

Kerzakov had just received the ball and was about to turn around, but the bad field made his previous beautiful turn look extremely clumsy. He hooked the ball, but the ball did not obediently follow him, but moved a little and then stopped.

His own body had already turned around.

At this time, CSKA Moscow defender Sergei Ignashevich rushed up and tried to steal the ball on the spot.

Fortunately, Kerzakov reacted quickly enough and kicked the ball out.

Anyway, Chen Yingxiong was right next to him.

Seeing the football rolling over, Chen Yingxiong did not stop the ball and then pass it to other teammates, but... he shot directly!

A long shot from more than 20 meters away from the goal!

At the moment when Chen Yingxiong drew the football, he felt his supporting foot suddenly slip!

The body then leaned to the left...

The result of this long shot can be imagined...

The football flew straight into the sky, high and wide.

There was a burst of laughter from the stands of Dynamo Stadium.

Some people were whistling with glee.

Chen Yingxiong was lying on the ground in a state of embarrassment, and with the laughter from the stands, his first long-range shot was a complete failure.

"...Let's take a look at this long shot - oops! It's so high and off target...Where exactly is he aiming?" Commentator Yuri Petrov was quite looking forward to it, but his tone changed as soon as the football flew out.

"Well, the ground is too slippery..." Then Petrov realized that he was too harsh, and he changed his words.

Chen Yingxiong got up from the ground and gestured to Kerzakov to thank him for the pass.

He suddenly thought of the dream he recalled when he woke up in the morning...

There seemed to be a masturbation scene in the dream.

Wasn't it such a coincidence?

Could it be that the dream had already foreshadowed that he would gain nothing today?