On August 8, 2004, the Chinese table tennis team arrived in Athens with the Chinese Olympic delegation. After half a year, after the Greek Table Tennis Open, Ye Hao set foot on this land for the second time.

After a day of rest in the hotel, on the afternoon of the 10th local time, the team was arranged to train in a training hall for the first time. The exterior of the training hall is a little shabby, but the quality of the tables is good, so it doesn't hinder training. In the morning, the host Glinka and the Belarusian star Samsolov were trained here.

The next day, the Chinese table tennis team entered the table tennis competition venue of the Galates Olympic Center in Athens for the first time for an hour-long acclimatization training. On the 12th, the national table tennis conducted acclimatization training at the competition venue for the last time, and the Olympic Games are about to officially begin.

On August 13, 2004, the opening ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games kicked off, and Ye Hao appeared in the Olympic Games for the first time with the Chinese Olympic delegation. Ye Hao slowly stepped into the stadium with the team, listening to the passionate music in his ears, and his heart was surging.

The Athens Olympic table tennis draw ceremony has ended, the 16th seeds in the men's singles are all in place, and the trident of the Chinese team is impressively listed. These 16 will directly participate in the 32-16 competition, and do not need to participate in the first two rounds of the men's singles.

According to the schedule of this Olympic Games, the Chinese table tennis team had byes in the first two rounds of the knockout rounds of the men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles and women's doubles, which made the national table tennis coaching staff really worried. Those who can survive two rounds in the knockout round are basically the key opponents in China's preparation list, and they will adjust to a relatively stable state technically and mentally through the adaptation of the two games.

Most of the Olympic recruits in the Chinese team, except for Kong Linghui and Wang Liqin, who have Olympic experience in the men's team, the other three are inexperienced "rookies". Especially in the doubles competition, according to the rules of the game, the two pairs of the Chinese team are divided into the same half of the zone, which means that the chances of players in the other half of the zone winning medals are greatly increased, so the doubles event is likely to become a breakthrough for others.

During the Olympic cycle from Sydney to Athens, the ITTF has made many changes to the rules of the competition, and in the past four years, it has given people a trance-like feeling of being separated from the world - the ball has become bigger, the score has decreased, and the serve cannot be blocked with the other hand, etc.

However, no matter how the rules change, the main theme of the international table tennis scene has not changed, and the world's strong countries are still racking their brains to deal with the Chinese, and they have also followed the model of the Chinese team, and started closed training before the competition, and when they arrived at the Olympic Games, they all ran to fight with Chinese athletes. As the first Olympic Games after a number of reforms of the ITTF, the Chinese table tennis team is under great pressure and is burdened with the mission of continuing its glory.

On August 16, the first two rounds of table tennis men's singles have ended, and it is about to be the turn of the Chinese team. The third round of the men's singles will last for two days, and the players of the Chinese table tennis team have successfully passed the first match.

Ye Hao's Olympic debut was against German veteran Roscoff, who has participated in four consecutive Olympic Games and is now ranked 29th in the world. As the "world's No. 1 backhand", Roskoff is now in the twilight of his strong man, although he relied on the advantage of holding the racket horizontally with his left hand, with rich experience in many Olympic Games, he won the first game 11-7 with fierce attacks and fights in the first game.

But Ye Hao's strength surpassed Roskopf by a large margin, and after the loss in the first game, he quickly adapted to the atmosphere of the Olympic Games, without the slightest feeling of restraint when he came up.

The second game was 11:6.

The third game is 11:5.

The fourth game was 11:6.

Game 5 11:4.

Ye Hao won four games in a row, showing the demeanor of a world champion and winning the first Olympic victory 4:1.

At the same time, Wang Liqin and Ma Lin also defeated their respective opponents after only losing one game and advanced to the fourth round of men's singles.

On August 18, the doubles event kicked off. The doubles front, which the coaching staff of the Chinese table tennis team is most worried about, has indeed a gap. Skipping the first round directly and entering the men's doubles 1/8 finals, the Kong Linghui/Wang Hao combination finally appeared on the court after ten days in Athens. Their opponents are Sweden's Waldner/Persson.

Although everyone expected that this game would be difficult, no one expected that Kong Linghui and Wang Hao's road to Athens would only take 30 minutes. They lost 1-4 to the 77-year-old Swedish veteran, who won one game and lost four games in a row. Lao Wa and Lao Pei are obviously prepared, facing Kong Linghui/Wang Hao, who is more than ten years younger than themselves, they behaved like newborn calves, from the first three boards to holding the ball, resolutely breaking through from the forehand position, and they have not been afraid of mistakes and played very tough.

In particular, Waldner's return skills played a crucial role in this match, not only did he see accurately, but also the quality of his quick swing and violent picks was very high, and he could often disrupt Kong Linghui and Wang Hao's stance with just one cricket, making it difficult to connect. Years of experience in fighting against China are not accumulated in vain, and Lao Wa and Lao Pei mercilessly gave the Chinese team Athens its first defeat.

It would be a mistake to think that Waldner's sniping of the Chinese combination was just accidental. On the afternoon of the 18th, Lao Wa, who had just sent away Kong Linghui and Wang Hao in the doubles arena, eliminated Ma Lin in the men's singles event. In this game, Waldner was ferocious as soon as he came on the field, and there was no transition to do it directly. After Marin lost two games in a row, he woke up like a dream and tried to save the situation by fighting. Unfortunately, his counter-attacks were not consistent, his serve did not change his landing points and spins, and his attacks lacked sharp sideways and backhand straights, all in all, he did not play at his true level.

Waldner saw through Marin's timidity, and frequently took the initiative to attack, whether it was the ball or the way of thinking, he reacted much faster than Marin, and many times he calculated the line accurately, waiting in place to directly hit Marin's return ball. After being tortured by the 39-year-old Lao Wa for 28 minutes, Marin was ruthlessly locked out of the quarterfinals, and the Chinese team's trident had been broken by one, and the bottom half of the men's singles was declared lost.

In the 1/8 finals, Niu Jianfeng lost 0:4 to North Korean player Kim Hyang-mei, causing a big upset in the women's singles field. In fact, in the previous Asian qualifiers, Niu Jianfeng defeated his opponent 4:2, but when it came to the Olympic Games, the result of the game was reversed by 180 degrees.

At the Sydney Olympics four years ago, although the Chinese table tennis team's road to winning the championship was extremely difficult, after three rounds, the upper and lower halves of the four events were still guarded. In Athens, only on the 18th, the Chinese table tennis team lost 3 foreign battles in a row, and the field was unexpected, 3 of the 4 events in the lower half of the area have been lost, and only Wang Lan is left in the women's singles.

The Chinese table tennis team fell into a precarious situation all of a sudden......