A team of yi jianlian in a lifetime

The no. 9 rookie, always as "easy". On October 27, the 34th birthday of Yi Jianlian, a veteran of the Chinese men's basketball team, Guangdong coach Du Feng issued such a "confession" to the former teammate and now love general.

For Yi Jianlian, there have been highlight moments that ignited the whole field, and he also endured the suffering of injuries. He has experienced highs and lows, and Yi Jianlian, who often shows himself in silence, no matter what kind of situation he is in, his 19-year career has truly been consistent.

Perfect comeback for the new season

On October 11, the new season of CBA League pre-season warm-up match was played in Zhuji, Zhejiang. In the battle between Guangdong and Shanxi on the same day, Yi Jianlian, who had been away from the game for more than a year, finally made a neat start, he played 16 minutes, although he looked a little rusty, but still won the team's high 14 points and 6 rebounds, and contributed 11 points in the second quarter. After the game, Yi Jianlian said that he had not played for too long, and at the beginning he was still a little uncomfortable, his hands were a little stiff, and the shooting rate was not very high, but he said: "The overall feeling is not bad, it is a good start." ”

After all, pre-season warm-ups are different from regular matches. On October 16, the new CBA season officially began, and Guangdong team faced the brothers of the same province Shenzhen in the opening match. Yi Jianlian returned to the CBA arena after a gap of 427 days and took over the championship ring in the cheers of the whole audience, and the atmosphere of the scene was pushed to a climax.

Familiar with counterattacks and tough defenses, the Guangdong team injected momentum into the opening match. Yi Jianlian played 7 minutes, scored the second-highest 16 points on 7-of-6 shooting, led the team to a 13-point lead at halftime, and established a 28-point advantage in the 3rd quarter, and finally won the next season 106-83.

"You can only describe the UAE League as a perfect comeback, which is very efficient in all aspects." Speaking of the uae's comeback performance, Du Feng was full of praise, he hopes that the young players will follow this example, "It is difficult for the veteran to recover, and he has such a state that cannot be separated from strict requirements for himself." ”

Although Yi Jianlian showed a good state in the opener, Du Feng also said that after experiencing such a serious injury, he should give more protection to Yi Jianlian, who has just returned, in the platoon deployment. In fact, from the matches since the opening match, it can also be seen that the Guangdong team has strict restrictions on the appearance of the UAE League. By the ninth round, Yi Jianlian had only played 3 games, with a total of only 32 minutes of playing time, and in most of the matches, it was the veteran Su Wei and the young player Zeng Fanri who shouldered the heavy responsibility of guangdong's internal attack and defense.

Sixteen years of service in Guangdong

At the end of August, the Guangdong men's basketball team completed the renewal of the contract with Yi Jianlian with a one-year Category C contract. Since entering the CBA League in 2002, Yi Jianlian has played for Guangdong Hongyuan for a total of 16 seasons, which can be called a lifelong team.

Yi Jianlian's first CBA championship did not make him wait too long, it was his second season in the league - in the 2003-2004 season, Guangdong team defeated a strong opponent and stood at the top of the CBA for the first time in history. In the following two seasons, Guangdong won two more championships, becoming the second "dynasty" team in the history of the CBA with a triple crown.

In 2007, Yi Jianlian went to the United States, where guangdong won 4 championships in 4 years. Yi Jianlian was extremely pleased with this, after all, the Guangdong team did not "collapse" because of his departure, which also proved the strength of the Guangdong team.

In the 2011-2012 season, Yi Jianlian returned to the CBA and witnessed Beijing become the new championship. After that, he led the Guangdong team to start competing with The beijing, Sichuan, Xinjiang, Liaoning and other teams for hegemony. In this process, Yi Jianlian and veterans such as Zhou Peng and Ren Junfei, as well as young people such as Zhao Rui, Hu Mingxuan, Du Runwang and Zeng Fanri, led the "South China Tigers" to rise again and re-established the status of the "dynasty" team of the Guangdong team.

In the third life-and-death battle of the 2019-2020 CBA Finals on the evening of August 15, 2020, Yi Jianlian left the field after falling to the ground without confrontation, and was later confirmed to have a broken right Achilles tendon. However, in the absence of Yi Jianlian, the Guangdong team still withstood the impact of the Liaoning team and won the championship. After the game, Su Wei carried Yi Jianlian to participate in the award ceremony, which touched countless fans.

Since then, Yi Jianlian has undergone 3 surgeries and entered a long recovery period, missing the entire season of the 2020-2021 cba league. The Guangdong team won the championship in a mourning posture, although the process was dangerous, but the thickness of the eleventh champion lineup and the background of the champion were convincing, and once again proved that the relationship between Yi Jianlian and the Guangdong team was mutually successful.

Today's Yi Jianlian is the CBA's historical total scoring king, total rebounding king, playoff block king... He is also the only player in the Chinese men's basketball team that competes in the Beijing Olympic Games who is still active on the field.

The national team forged ahead

In June this year, Yi Jianlian entered the Chinese men's basketball team to prepare for the Asian Cup qualifiers and the Tokyo Olympic Games, but before the team left, the UAE League withdrew because of "a long lack of training, and the feeling that it has not yet met the requirements for immediate participation".

Withdrawal is an extremely rare moment in Yi Jianlian's more than ten years of national team career.

In 2004, Harris, the "Silver Fox" who was the head coach of the Chinese men's basketball team, let the young Yi Jianlian stand on the stage of the Olympic Games for the first time, when he was the little brother behind many big brothers, but he was already the absolute leader of the younger generation. The Athens Olympics proved Harris's choice right, and Yi Jianlian effectively contributed 2.7 points and 3.8 rebounds per game in a few hours. Two years later, at the World Championships in Japan, Yi Jianlian quickly surpassed his predecessors and grew into the main player of the national team.

At the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Yi Jianlian was already a very important scorer and rebounder of the Chinese men's basketball team. The "melon" Anthony in the gap between the dream eight team and the final moment of the life-and-death battle with the German team... It's unforgettable to this day.

In the trough of the Chinese men's basketball team, Yi Jianlian's performance was obvious to all, especially in the 2010 World Championships in Turkey, he averaged 20.2 points and 10.2 rebounds per game, and was crowned the champion of rebounding in the tournament, ranking third among all the players in the game.

With the retirement of Yao Ming, Wang Zhizhi and others, Yi Jianlian has become the only core of the Chinese men's basketball team, but in a relatively long time, the national team is facing the dilemma of talent outage. The London 2012 Olympics were the toughest periods, but Yi Jianlian, who lacked helpers, still averaged 14.8 points and 10.2 rebounds per game, making him the tournament rebounding champion. In the group stage against Spain, under the combined attack of the Gasol brothers and Ibaka, Yi Jianlian still had 30 points and 12 rebounds, which was amazing.

During this trough period, Yi Jianlian still took every game seriously, and even chose to fight with an injury when he was injured. At the 2018 Jakarta Asian Games, the Chinese men's basketball team finally walked through the lowest trough and re-reached the top of Asia, and Yi Jianlian's tomahawk dunk on the Iranian team Bahrami froze the wonderful moments in the history of the Chinese men's basketball team.

However, in the 2019 World Cup, the Chinese men's basketball team lost the opportunity to get tickets to the Tokyo Olympic Games at home, but Yi Jianlian's performance in the World Cup still set an example for the national team teammates. Especially in the last game against the powerful Nigerian team, Yi Jianlian, who fought until the last moment, scored 27 points, and the photo of him surrounded by 4 Nigerian players under the basket made countless fans moved.

Starting with the Tokyo Olympics, Olympic qualification is linked to World Cup results. Missing the ticket to Tokyo, looking ahead, the Chinese men's basketball team competed for the qualification for the Paris Olympic Games more difficult.

In fact, in an interview before the 2019 World Cup, Yi Jianlian said a sad sentence: "As a leader, I am worse... I've never led my national team to a world series in the last decade, and I've failed. "The words are tinged with shame and self-blame, which makes people feel sad. In fact, what kind of leader Yi Jianlian is, there is no need to explain too much, Yi Jianlian's national team career is qualified or not, excellent or not, in our hearts have long had a clear answer.

Many people's evaluation of Yi Jianlian has an ups and downs process from high to low and then to high, but although it is hard, blowing out the wild sand begins to gold. We can clearly see how good Yi Jianlian is, how much he has paid along the way, and has never been lost.

Reporter of this newspaper, Hu Jianhua

Source: China Sports News