Chapter 1周易在多特蒙德的第一场热身赛表现很快就被中国记者们报道回了国内。

Zhou Yi's performance in his first friendly match for Dortmund was quickly reported back to China by Chinese journalists.

Because it was an unofficial match, there was no television coverage, so if Chinese fans couldn't watch the game live, they could only learn about Zhou Yi's specific performance through reports from domestic media.

At this time, Internet new media fully demonstrated their advantage of reporting faster than traditional print media, radio, and television. At 11:30 p.m. Beijing time that same night, the fastest report appeared on a portal website and was quickly forwarded by enthusiastic netizens to various forums and QQ groups.

"...In the afternoon local time, Dortmund and Wolfsburg played a friendly match in Switzerland. In this match, our Chinese player Zhou Yi started and was not substituted until the fifty-seventh minute. He was the player who played the longest for the team, playing for nearly an hour... In addition to playing for a long time, Zhou Yi performed very well in the match. In the first half, he repeatedly made brilliant passes to his teammates, creating many scoring opportunities. In the thirty-eighth minute, he assisted Barrios to score, completing his first assist for Dortmund!"

"...In the second half, Zhou Yi was the only starter who remained on the field. His performance in the second half was still outstanding. In the fifty-sixth minute, he suddenly moved forward, received a pass from Kuba, and scored his first goal for Dortmund with a long shot... We can say that Zhou Yi's performance in his first game for the first team was perfect. If this were an official match, he could be given the highest score in the team!"

Fang Shuai immediately reposted this news to the Zhou Yi fan forum. He had read this news over and over again, and every time he saw it, he was very excited. Although there were only words, he couldn't help but turn these journalists' words into images in his mind, imagining Zhou Yi's heroic姿态 on the field.

He refreshed the webpage. There were already as many as five pages of replies under this news, and they were not the kind of purely spam replies, but all contained substance.

Almost the vast majority of people were cheering for Zhou Yi and feeling happy for Zhou Yi's performance.

Of course, there were also other voices.

When the forest grows large, all kinds of birds appear.

As Zhou Yi was reported by domestic media, the number of followers in the Zhou Yi fan forum increased sharply. The result of the mixing of mud and sand was that in addition to the real Zhou Yi fans, some troublemakers also came.

They may be fans of other players, and they felt uncomfortable seeing the media praising Zhou Yi so hard now. Maybe they were Chinese football haters, who couldn't bear to see any good news about Chinese football.

At this time, they couldn't wait to jump out and show their calmness, wisdom, and intellectual superiority, pointing fingers at the country and making sweeping criticisms.

"...It's just a friendly match, and the media is hyping it up so much. What 'highest score in the team,' I'm ashamed to even look at it! The domestic media has no other skills, only boasting, making every Chinese player seem like Messi or Ronaldo! I don't believe that Zhou Yi's ability is as great as the media is hyping it up. What steady and calm, what tacit understanding... It's really boasting without drafting!"

Fang Shuai replied to this person: "Of course, this is just a friendly match, but at least it's a good start, isn't it? And isn't it better to perform well in a friendly match than to perform badly in a friendly match?"

He really thought so. A good start is very important. As the saying goes, everything is difficult at the beginning, but Zhou Yi's start was so smooth, which was always a good thing.

※※※

With a goal and an assist in the match, and many scoring opportunities created for his teammates, no matter how you looked at it, Zhou Yi's performance in this friendly match was outstanding enough.

So everyone who saw Zhou Yi would congratulate him.

Facing the congratulations and best wishes from his teammates, Zhou Yi wore a smile on his face. He seemed to be very satisfied with his performance in his first match.

But after entering the virtual world that night, Zhou Yi frowned, and the relaxed and complacent smile he had in front of others disappeared.

"Chu Ling," he called.

"What's the matter, Zhou Yi?" Chu Ling said.

"Why have I never felt physically exhausted after about sixty minutes in so many matches I've played against Wolfsburg in the virtual system?" He looked up at Chu Ling and asked.

This was the question that had been bothering him since the end of today's match. In today's match against Wolfsburg, he couldn't continue to persist after playing for only sixty minutes, so he had to take the initiative to admit defeat and ask to be substituted.

But why hadn't he encountered such a problem even once in so many matches he had played in the virtual world? What exactly went wrong?

"Because I turned off the stamina depletion penalty," Chu Ling said.

"What... is that?"

"Although this system can perfectly simulate reality, I didn't choose to map reality in terms of stamina," Chu Ling explained.

"Eh, why not?" Zhou Yi asked.

"If I followed reality in terms of stamina, you wouldn't be able to play a match a day in this space," Chu Ling spread her hands. "Think about it, how can anyone play a match every day like that in reality?"

Zhou Yi was speechless.

"Uh, can you remove this mechanism?"

"I can, but I don't recommend you do that," Chu Ling said.

"Why?"

"It's very simple. Why are you playing matches here? It's to accumulate enough match experience. So, after introducing real stamina, what's the point of your matches in the virtual world?" Chu Ling retorted. "You can only play half a match in the virtual world, how will that help you? This kind of 'reality' is not worth pursuing. Improving your physical fitness still depends on your physical training in reality, not on training here. You can't improve your physical fitness here. You should understand that very well."

Zhou Yi thought about it. That was indeed the case. This was originally a place to cheat, and pursuing reality was really... meaningless.

"Okay, if we're not changing it, then we're not changing it. Let's train!"

※※※

When Götze woke up at six thirty to prepare to wash up and then go to the team's seven o'clock morning training, he was surprised to find that the bed next to him was empty. Zhou Yi was not lying on it, and the quilt was turned over, a little messy.

"Zhou Yi?" he called out, but no one answered him.

"Are you in the bathroom?"

Still no one answered him.

He rolled over from the bed and ran barefoot to the bathroom door, where there was no one.

Zhou Yi was no longer in the room.

Götze scratched the back of his head.

Could this kid have gone to morning training?

But how could that be? Doesn't morning training start at seven o'clock?

Or... did he go for a morning run?

But no matter how Götze thought about it, he felt it was unlikely, because since coming to the first team to participate in training, three training sessions a day were enough to prevent Zhou Yi from having any thoughts or energy to go for a morning run, and he had never seen Zhou Yi on the first team's morning run.

So what exactly did Zhou Yi go to do?

Götze's doubts were revealed when he came to the gym with his teammates—Zhou Yi was indeed sweating like rain on the equipment...

"Zhou Yi?" Kevin Großkreutz was surprised to see Zhou Yi in the gym, and he couldn't help but call out, "What are you doing here?"

But Zhou Yi ignored him. Of course, it wasn't intentional, but Zhou Yi really didn't have the strength to respond. He was panting for breath on the treadmill, his upper body t-shirt was completely soaked, tightly贴 in his body, revealing the muscle lines inside. At the same time, on the treadmill conveyor belt under his feet, a large area had been soaked with sweat.

Seeing Zhou Yi like this, Großkreutz couldn't ask any more questions.

Not only him, but also the other Dortmund players were呆呆地 looking at Zhou Yi, who had obviously been training for a while. Götze was in the crowd, with a look of stunned silence.

He didn't expect that Zhou Yi, who had disappeared when he woke up, had come to the gym early and was sweating like rain!

This kid is really working hard!

※※※

When eating breakfast, Götze met Zhou Yi and asked him what was going on during morning training.

Zhou Yi naturally couldn't say that it was because he had lost a bet with Klopp and this was his punishment, that would be too embarrassing... He wanted only the two of them to know about his gambling with the head coach.

So he said with a look of righteousness: "To stay in the first team, of course, you have to put in more effort."

"Are you serious, Zhou Yi?" Götze asked in surprise.

"Nonsense! Otherwise, do you think I would be willing to get up so early? I now get up at six fifteen!" Zhou Yi complained. "I also want to sleep a little longer, I also want to be more relaxed, but in order to stay in the first team, if I don't pay some price now, then when the training is over, I may have to go back to the U19s, I don't want that!"

Seeing Zhou Yi speak so passionately, Götze clapped his hands: "Okay, decided!"

"What did you decide?" Zhou Yi asked strangely.

"I'm going to get up early and train with you too!"

Zhou Yi opened his mouth wide.

"Seeing you work so hard, I can't lose to you, Zhou Yi!" Götze said with fighting spirit.

Zhou Yi supported his forehead.