Long life, grateful for walking all the way, your "attention" is my biggest motivation for renewal.
"It's long past time to retire, Internet celebrities earn more money!"
Netizens ridiculed the news of Zhao Lina's retirement.
On April 14, the 31-year-old "most beautiful goalkeeper" of the Chinese women's football team Zhao Lina announced her retirement on major social platforms:
"Today is not the end of my life football path, when I lose the aura of the athlete field, I think my responsibility and mission are not over."
This is not the first time Zhao Lina has "retired", as early as after the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta, she announced her temporary retirement from the national team and began to enter the short video industry.
Now she and her team have made millions of profits on the Douyin platform alone, becoming a "big Internet celebrity" in China's women's football industry.
The road to football is not easy
In 1991, Zhao Lina was born in a warm family in Shanghai. Both parents are tall, so Zhao Lina's height has been top-notch since she was a child.
When I was in the first grade of primary school, the football coach of the Shanghai city team came to the school to recruit people, took a fancy to the tall Zhao Lina, and invited her to participate in trial training.
Zhao Lina, who has been lively since childhood, has a strong motor cell, so she was effortless during the trial, ran and jumped a few times on the playground, and was selected.
But at that time, Zhao Lina did not understand what football was, but everyone praised the Chinese women's football team as a hero in the eyes of everyone, and she also wanted to be a hero, so she joined the football team without hesitation.
Since then, football has become a big part of Zhao Lina's life.
After Zhao Lina joined the district team, she often went to the stadium to train, regardless of spring, summer, autumn and winter, the training never ended. Sweat soaked her clothes and hair, and even if she was too tired to move her legs, she was not absent once.
During a training break, in the third grade, she said to her peers while her coach was away:
"My dad said that goalkeepers are the least productive, and I don't want to be a goalkeeper."
Coincidentally, this sentence happened to be heard by the coach who returned to the training ground, so the coach arranged for Zhao Lina to "try to guard the goal".
At that time, she was the youngest of the goalkeepers in the team, her strength and level were very poor, and over time, she would doubt herself because she always did not do well, and even had the idea of "changing careers".
"I definitely want to kick up, since I want to be a hero, I can't stop halfway!"
Zhao Lina, who has a strong heart, quickly adjusted her emotions, and she firmly believes that what others can do well, she will definitely be able to do well.
It is said that "the eighteen changes of the female university, the more it changes, the better it looks", and Zhao Lina is no exception.
As she gets older, she gets taller and taller, and her appearance becomes more and more outstanding, and there will be model agents to talk to her and invite her to work in the modeling industry. But she was so focused on football that she decisively refused these opportunities to "change careers".
Fortunately, Zhao Lina persevered, and it didn't take long for her to enter the youth team and be able to play.
What really made Zhao Lina fall in love with football was the first time the team arranged for her to play in the United States. When they walked onto the stage, the crowd was so large that almost the entire seats were filled, and deafening cheers echoed in the ears.
Zhao Lina only felt her blood boiling, "I feel that I can kick a few more meters if I pounce!" She said excitedly to her teammates on the side.
The fans were cheering for them, and at that moment Zhao Lina suddenly understood why she wanted to play, she just wanted to be seen, wanted to have her own fans, and wanted to prove herself in front of so many people.
Since then, Zhao Lina has trained harder, just to "climb higher".
In January 2015, Zhao Lina became a goalkeeper of the Chinese women's football team and participated in a 20-day training camp in Guangzhou for the World Cup.
In April of the same year, Zhao Lina participated in the China Women's Super League as a goalkeeper of Shanghai Guotai Junan Yongbai Women's Football Club.
In the entire 14 rounds of the season, Zhao Lina conceded only 11 goals in goal, with the lowest average goal rate per game, not only becoming the best goalkeeper of the season, but also contributing to the team's winning season championship.
As soon as the Women's Super League ended, Zhao Lina devoted herself to the training of the Chinese women's football team to participate in the Women's World Cup in Canada. Half a month later, she was selected for the Chinese women's football team for the Olympic squad, and although she was only a substitute goalkeeper, Zhao Lina was so excited that she didn't sleep all night.
Although she was prepared not to play, when the substitute really did not have the opportunity to play on the day of the game, Zhao Lina's heart was still a little lost.
So she started training harder so that she could be a starter for the next game.
Zhao Lina's efforts finally paid off, and on December 3, 2015, the Chinese team played a friendly warm-up match with Italy, Zhao Lina started as a goalkeeper, made four timely saves in the game, and cooperated with her teammates to help the team draw 1-1, bringing her debut to a successful end.
Zhao Lina's brilliant performance in the game won the trust of then-women's football coach Bruno Bini, and in the next three games, Zhao Lina played as a starter.
She lived up to her manager's expectations and performed well, especially in the final friendly match with the United States, where the opponent had twice as many shots on goal, but thanks to Zhao Lina's timely save, she finally kept the score at 1-0, ending the myth of the United States' 22-game victory for China.
In fact, before this warm-up match, Wang Fei, the former main goalkeeper of the Chinese women's football team, retired, and Zhao Lina, who took over the main goalkeeper position from her predecessors, was not favored by everyone, and people were a little picky about this young post-90s girl, thinking that she lacked experience in the competition and could not take on this heavy responsibility.
However, Zhao Lina used her amazing performance to block the mouths of Yoyo and make people "shine" with her strength. For Zhao Lina's performance in the game, even the French praised:
"She is very calm, unhurried, and very easy-going person in life."
In March 2016, Zhao Lina became the main goalkeeper of the Chinese team in the women's football qualifiers for the Rio Olympics.
In the 5 qualifiers, the Chinese women's football team defeated Vietnam, Japan and South Korea, and tied with North Korea and Australia, and Zhao Lina played a great role in helping the Chinese team to achieve the second place in the qualifiers and successfully enter the Rio Olympics.
For a time, Zhao Lina quickly became popular on the Internet, and with her superior figure of 1.87 meters and beautiful appearance, she won the title of "the most beautiful goalkeeper". Even Japanese media put Zhao Lina's photo in the headlines, calling her "both strength and beauty."
But luck didn't always take care of her, and in the August match against the Brazilian women's team, Zhao Lina missed a mistake and failed to save the ball, and her teammates also made mistakes, and finally lost 3-0 to Brazil.
Despite losing the game, Zhao Lina and her teammates were not discouraged, they believed that there are no perfect people in the world, mistakes are always inevitable, and the most important thing is to learn from the lesson and strive not to make two mistakes in the same place.
At the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta, Zhao Lina once again started as the main goalkeeper. The Chinese women's football team "passed five levels and cut six" all the way to the final, against the Japanese team. Under the full expectation of the fans, all the players felt "pressured".
The girls struggled with Japan until the 90th minute, when the opposing player hit the goal with a header, and Zhao Lina watched the ball get into the net.
"Why was it killed at the last minute? Why didn't you save that ball? ”
These questions kept circling in her head, Zhao Lina felt that the ball she had the ability to save, she couldn't figure out why she didn't save successfully, and the tight strings in her brain were finally broken in self-blame.
She decided to temporarily retire from the national team, give herself a vacation, and adjust her mentality while continuing to train in the Shanghai team.
There were a lot of criticism and doubts on the Internet, and these words would make Zhao Lina feel aggrieved and scared at first, but she finally figured it out herself:
"I don't want to be a 100% perfect Zhao Lina, I'll just be myself."
"Another personality"
On the court, Zhao Lina is steady and calm, and she can always find a suitable way to save the football that rushes to the goal.
In daily life, Zhao Lina has a completely opposite personality. She not only loves esports games, but also plays rock. Between trainings, she would go to the lounge and play a drum kit for a while. Rhythmic drums can often be heard on the pitch.
On her days off, she will also ask her teammates to go to the Internet café to play LOL (League of Legends). A few girls walked in and sat in a row like a man, often attracting surprised glances from the surroundings.
After retiring in 2018, just in time for the rise of Douyin in China, Zhao Lina also began to send videos to update her daily life.
Because of the contrast between her "trendy and funny" personality and beautiful face, Zhao Lina gained a lot of fans and began to have a team to help her run an account. From a video with hundreds of likes, to now each one is tens of thousands of likes, or even tens of millions of likes.
Zhao Lina's video style is changeable, some teach football skills, some play drums, and there are training daily and cross-dressing videos, netizens praise "eye-catching".
Until the 2022 Indian Women's Asian Cup, Zhao Lina was invited to play in the national team jersey again and became a substitute for the Chinese team. This time, the Chinese team defeated the South Korean team 3-2 to achieve a big comeback and win the Asian Cup, and everyone stood up and cheered.
Sitting on the sidelines, Zhao Lina raised her camera to record this exciting moment, and she and the team lifted the championship trophy together.
"It can be regarded as washing away the shadow of the Asian Games being killed." In the interview, Zhao Lina's tone was filled with pride and relief.
In May of the same year, Zhao Lina was selected into the second training list of the Chinese women's football team and continued to participate in training with the national team.
Decommissioned again
Thanks to her tall figure and face that "resembles Zhang Tianai", Zhao Lina has been invited to participate in many variety shows, and her fans are increasing. She began to broadcast live on the Douyin platform, "chattering" with netizens and receiving a lot of tips.
As her popularity grew higher and her voices became more and more skeptical, Zhao Lina was once again pushed to the cusp.
"You are a professional player, you don't work hard every day to shoot short videos, can you still play well?"
In the face of fermenting public opinion, Zhao Lina bravely stood up and responded.
She said that like her team, she trains six days a week, but on the only day off, she will take her team on a nearly 40-degree pitch and shoot a whole day of video against the big sun. Just so that everyone can learn more about football, and I hope that more people will like football.
"I just want fans who don't have the opportunity to train professionally to learn some of the expertise and skills of football and goalkeeping."
She also hopes that the girls who see her videos will not blindly pursue the beauty of appearance, but can be presented in front of others in a confident and sunny state.
Gradually, Zhao Lina almost focused her work on short video production, became the most influential Internet celebrity blogger in Chinese women's football, and was also invited to participate in the Beijing Satellite TV Gala.
Some time ago, in the guest list of the online "Sister Riding the Wind and Waves Season 4", Zhao Lina's name was prominently listed.
In this case, Zhao Lina's decision to withdraw from the national team is not surprising.
Zhao Lina said in the retirement video that she has been dealing with football for 24 years, and her future life will not leave football, and she will continue to update her "football teaching".
Later, she posted a video inviting everyone to join her in Project Planet:
"It was football that gave me glory and starlight, and now, I want to illuminate more people and let the seeds of football germinate in the hearts of more children."
She plans to visit 100 primary schools in remote areas in the future and devote herself to football public welfare projects, so that every child who loves football can have a ball to play.
epilogue
31-year-old Zhao Lina has been no longer young in her body after 24 years of training, and her knee pain has also made her rethink her future path.
Taking advantage of this outlet, it is actually a smart thing for her to choose to retire from the national team and enter the entertainment industry.
Zhao Mingjian, a previously retired male national football player, recently cried in a live broadcast, saying that "a monthly salary of more than 10,000 is not enough to pay rent." However, netizens did not buy it, mocking him for "really not enough to buy sea cucumbers". If Zhao Lina broadcasts "crying poor while making money" like him, I am afraid that she will also receive a scolding.
"Every step in front of me is unknown, but I still have to bravely rush forward because there are so many people supporting me, I am not alone."
I hope that the most beautiful goddess of Chinese women's football will not disappoint us, and I hope that her future life path will be more exciting.