Yang Sijie, Zhao Yue and Niu Guohong stood on the podium. They were the champion, runner-up and third runner-up respectively.
Tsinghua University won the gold and bronze medals, looking like the dominant sprinter among college students, and attracted envious glances from all around.
However, Dai Li felt very heavy. When he thought of Zhao Yue's experience, he felt both sympathy and regret.
After Zhao Yue was diagnosed with bone cancer, it was when he needed others' care the most, but the national team gave up on him mercilessly.
Twenty-three-year-old Zhao Yue should have started to reach the peak of his career as an athlete. However, due to a misdiagnosis, he wasted three years of his youth. When he returned to the competition, he had already begun to enter the stage of an athlete. It's downhill.
"It's too cruel!" Dai Li lowered his eyes silently. He was a little afraid to look at Zhao Yue on the podium.
After all, Dai Li had studied in the national team for such a long time. The collective honor in his heart made Dai Li somewhat unable to believe Zhao Yue's experience.
In reality, there are many similar examples. The former champions set up street stalls, the former champions sold braised food, and the former champions worked as doormen. Similar reports can be found on the Internet, and they are even promoted by the media as a model of self-improvement and self-reliance.
However, in Li Dai's view, these reports are more like moaning without reason. For most athletes, retirement is more like a disaster. Domestic athletes have been training since childhood and do not have any skills other than being an athlete. Retirement is equivalent to losing the means of making a living for athletes.
Especially those athletes who seek self-employment after retirement. They have no academic qualifications, no skills, and nothing except well-developed limbs. With a mere tens of thousands of yuan in retirement money in hand, it is only enough to set up a street stall. What else can they do besides setting up a street stall
In comparison, Zhao Yue was obviously even more unlucky. He lost everything as an athlete and was also burdened with debts.
Zhao Yue suffered from the disease himself, and the responsibility cannot be placed on the national team, but Li Dai can understand Zhao Yue's mood. What a helpless person needs most is care and encouragement from others, but Zhao Yue was forced to retire at this time. He will naturally vent all the negative emotions in his heart to the national team.
Li Dai felt that Xue Li must be told about this matter.
…
Dai Li dialed Xue Li's cell phone.
"Xiao Li, how was the Universiade competition? Did you win the championship?" Xue Li's voice rang from the mobile phone.
"I won the championship, and also won a third place." Dai Li replied.
"Yes, you didn't embarrass me! You didn't embarrass the national team either. Keep working hard!" Xue Li continued: "You called specifically to tell Tsinghua University about winning the championship, right?"
"There was an athlete named Zhao Yue. Do you still have any impressions?" Li Dai asked.
"Zhao Yue!" Xue Li on the other end of the phone sighed: "He is an excellent youngster with great talent. He had the hope of becoming a top sprinter. Unfortunately, he got bone cancer and had to have his leg amputated. Why, are you in Wanwan? Did Zhou meet Zhao Yue?"
"We met." Li Dai said immediately.
"How is he? Is he in a wheelchair or wearing a prosthetic limb? The cancer cells have not spread again, right?" Xue Li asked eagerly.
Li Dai felt a little surprised. In Zhao Yue's description, the national team was so ruthless. However, from Xue Li's tone, Li Dai could hear a kind of caring from the heart.
"Zhao Yue did not make a wheelchair or wear a prosthetic limb." Li Dai continued: "I just said that he won the first and third place, and the second place winner is Zhao Yue!"
"What? Can his legs last until now?" Xue Li couldn't believe it.
"That bone cancer was a misdiagnosis..." Dai Li repeated what Zhao Yue said. Including things like his failure to apply for treatment funds after he was injured, and being forced to retire by the national team and go to the United States for treatment.
"This child has suffered a lot." Xue Li sighed, and then fell into silence.
Li Dai said: "Coach, I think Zhao Yue should try to help him in that situation. The national team forced him to retire, which is a bit too much!"
"I guessed you would ask about this." Xue Li explained: "After Zhao Yue was diagnosed with bone cancer, I also helped him apply for the injury treatment fund, but the application was not approved by the superiors."
"Bone cancer is not an injury caused by training and competition, right?" Dai Li asked.
"This is also a reason for rejection. The main reason is because the superiors are not willing to pay the money. They may think it is a waste of money. The cost of treating cancer is itself a huge bottomless pit. The doctor's diagnosis for Zhao Yue at that time was With conservative treatment, there is almost no possibility of cure. If you want to save your life, you must amputate." Xue Li said.
"That's not because I feel that even if Zhao Yue is cured, he can no longer be an athlete and has no value, so we won't treat him!" Li Dai said angrily.
"After all, our funds are limited, and good steel must be used on the edge. Every year, many athletes are injured due to training or competition, and they also need money for medical treatment. We spent 1.8 million to treat Zhao Yue's bone cancer. We still need to face an unknown outcome. And the same amount of money can allow a dozen injured athletes to return to the game."
Xue Li took a deep breath: "What we in sports need are results. Only with results can we get more financial support and this project can continue to survive. And there can only be one champion, so there will always be someone who needs to sacrifice." . I have been a coach for so many years and have seen a lot of things and experienced a lot of helplessness. Sometimes I even feel that this industry is more cruel than the jungle of the jungle in the African savannah."
Dai Li opened his mouth, but did not speak. This is how competitive sports are, the winner is king, and the loser may not even have a chance to "lose as bandit"! This is true for individual athletes, and it is true for entire sports.
Xue Li continued: "The application for the injury treatment fund was not approved, so Zhao Yue's mother came to the team and found the head coach and me. Zhao Yue's mother asked us to retire Zhao Yue."
"Didn't the national team force Zhao Yue to retire?" Li Dai didn't expect that things would turn around.
"Are we so unkind? Zhao Yue is a member of the national team after all. Even if he gets bone cancer, we will not force him to retire!" Xue Li continued: "Retirement is the result of his mother's strong will His mother didn’t want him to continue being an athlete.”
"Zhao Yue doesn't know about this?" Li Dai asked.
"Zhao Yue doesn't know that his mother has been here, because Zhao Yue's mother sincerely asks our national team to keep her secret and not to tell Zhao Yue that she has been to the national team. Zhao Yue's mother knows that he is definitely not willing to retire. And we It was also at the request of Zhao Yue’s family that we completed the retirement procedures for Zhao Yue,” Xue Li said.
"It seems that the national team took the blame for Zhao Yue's parents regarding forced retirement!" Li Dai thought of this and then asked: "Why? Why did Zhao Yue's mother do this?"
"Perhaps his mother thinks that he is working too hard!" Xue Li sighed: "What a pitiful parent in the world!"