Football career: From winning the championship to becoming a legend

The time was May 2005, 5, 30:7:09 in the morning, 55, 56, 57... Beep! Snap! Very good, very punctual, Ricardo's biological clock successfully intercepted his alarm clock's daily work. He put the alarm clock back on the bedside table, got up, stretched hard, and pulled open the floor-length curtains of the apartment. Well, the weather is good today, it's a sunny morning!

Just as he was about to go to the place of reincarnation to relax the burden of the night and wake up from his sleepiness, "My skin's still burining from your touch...", the Nokia 7610 rang.

Turning back, unplugging the charging cable, oh, it was an acquaintance, the head of the national team - Pierluigi Casiraghi. Ricciardo recalled the image of a slightly fat man who was beginning to go bald in middle age: I heard that he was a handsome guy when he played football, I hope I won’t go bald in middle age too...

Ricardo quickly answered the phone: "Pronto (Hello)? Buongiorno (Good morning), this is Ricci (Li Qi)."

The voice on the other end of the line said: "Hello Ricardo, this is Pierluigi. I'm calling to inform you that the Italian U20 national team has officially called you up to participate in this year's World Youth Championship. You must report to the AC Milan club's training base before 6 a.m. on June 7th. After three days of training at the base, you will leave for the Netherlands on the 10th."

Ricardo: "Okay, boss, got it. I have classes these two days, and my flight back to Milan is on Wednesday afternoon... Yes, June 6st..."

Casiraghi: "You will be appointed captain. Please arrive early and we will discuss it. Most of them are your former U19 and U17 teammates..."

Ricardo said something in English: "Copy that! I will report to the coaching staff one day in advance."

After hanging up the phone, Ricardo lay back on the bed, stretching lazily: The 2005 World Youth Championship in the Netherlands is coming, why do I always feel so excited? I can't figure it out, maybe it has something to do with Ricardo's other half or past life? But is it appropriate to call it past life?

The World Youth Championship here refers to the FIFA U-20 World Cup, which is the FIFA World Youth Football Championship for men under 20 years old and is held every two years. Countless football superstars have emerged from the World Youth Championship, such as Maradona in 20, Luis Figo in 1979, Owen in 1991, and the upcoming World Youth Championship in the Netherlands, which was supposed to be the starting point for Ricardo's club teammate Messi's road to fame...

The 2005 World Youth Championship held in the Netherlands was not only the starting point for Messi's legendary career, but also another oriental team. The Chinese youth team also performed well in this tournament, winning all three group matches and joining hands with the German youth team in the knockout stage to score a goal. The team featured the so-called 3 golden generation, such as Cheng Tao, Feng Xiaoting, Gao Lin, Hao Junmin, etc.

Yes, the age requirement for this World Youth Championship is that young players were born after January 1985, 1. Therefore, a large number of stars who emerged in this cup were born in 1 and 85. There are also some players like Messi who were born in 86, but not many. As for whether there are cheats to change their age, this is beyond Ricardo's knowledge...

Why does Ricardo know so much? Here I would like to introduce Ricardo first. His full name is Ricardo Ricci, male, born on June 1986, 6 in Milan, Italy, Gemini.

(Voiceover: Girls love to know about zodiac signs. Ricardo also thinks it may have something to do with his current situation, but he can’t explain it in a few words…)

Ricardo is a professional football player, currently playing for the Spanish club Barcelona, ​​as a midfielder. Of course, as a youngster, he also plays as a winger, full-back and other less important positions. As long as he can play, the position is not a problem. Although Ricardo is currently playing for a club in China, he is a native of Taiwan. He made his debut in the youth training camp of Inter Milan in Italy because he grew up nearby, which is near Como in the north of Milan.

Ricardo transferred to La Masia last summer, 2004, mainly because of his uncle's relationship. He found the famous La Fatso and settled two clubs. Of course, he was just an 18-year-old transparent kid - although he had a little talent, such as bullying the kids of the same age in various U17 and U19 competitions (being a little arrogant)...

As for why Ricardo transferred from Inter Milan, a local giant close to home, to Barcelona in Spain, he said he had a feeling that the Dream Team 2 and Dream Team 3 would be formed soon in Barcelona, ​​and he came here to level up, do you believe it? Also, Serie A will change next summer, do you believe it?

How did Ricardo know this? This story started 11 years ago.

It was the summer of 94. Ricardo's parents took him and his brother to the United States to watch the World Cup. Italy was very successful that year and made it to the final! The opponent was Brazil. Yes, Romario, Cafu and Dunga were all on the opposite side. But Italy had Roberto Baggio! Although he missed the penalty kick in the final...

Well, these are not the main points. According to the memories of Ricardo and his family, the situation at that time should be like this...

Dad: "Baggio missed the penalty in the final... (Omitted several thousand words about Ricardo's dad's views on the game, regrets and mental journey)... Poor son Ricardo, you have been a fan of Baggio since you were a child. You watched your idol miss the World Cup because of a mistake, and you were heartbroken. Your young mind must have been greatly shocked, which in turn stimulated and seriously affected your brain nerves..."

Mom: "After watching the final, our family decided to go out for a nice meal to relieve the stress of losing. It wasn't our fault, right? Well, after we had our fill, we left the restaurant. There was a group of drunk shirtless strong guys..."

(Ricardo interjected: How come you remember he was a strong young man?)

(Mom: Ahem, that’s not the point, okay? Besides, isn’t your mom beautiful?!)

(Ricardo could not refute: That is of course extremely beautiful...)

"...after seeing my beautiful figure, they wanted to tease me. Fortunately, you, my father, and my brother joined hands to protect me and drove away the group of drunks. The Coke bottle you threw seemed to have knocked one drunk unconscious. It was at that time that the drunks' noisy smell of alcohol polluted your young mind. You know, from then on you became severely allergic to alcohol. When you were a child, you seemed to be able to drink a little..."

Brother: "I was sad because we lost in the final, but you were only 8 years old at the time. You didn't know anything. You didn't even understand the game. You just knew it was lively... After dinner, you went back to the hotel and took a bath in the bathtub. Mom and Dad went out for a walk, and you didn't come out for more than half an hour - anyway, all 5 episodes of Tom and Jerry were finished. When I went in to see you, you had fainted in the bathtub. I didn't know how you fainted. Anyway, I saw that your head was exposed and you were breathing normally, so you looked fine, so I took you out and put you on the bed. Who knew that you would have aphasia for nearly a year afterwards..."

Yes, except for his brother, there were no eyewitnesses. He didn't remember exactly what happened. Was it the phone next to the bathtub that leaked electricity? He didn't remember much about the aphasia period either. Anyway, he insisted that all the embarrassing things during that period were made up by his parents and brother to tease him...

When Ricardo regained clear memories, it was indeed the summer vacation of 1995 (they said that little Ricardo recovered because he was anxious to grab ice cream from his brother); it seemed that he recovered little by little, but it was also like turning on the light in a dark room, and the world or memory suddenly became bright. When Ricardo regained his memories, his mind was filled with a lot more...experience and predictions!

Why are they called experience and prediction? Because although a small part of the extra things are memories, most of them are things that have not happened, such as Ronaldinho joining Barcelona after parting ways with Paris Saint-Germain in the summer of 2003, and the Serie A Calciopoli scandal in 2006.

Have you ever doubted these extra "memories"? Of course I doubted them! But as time went by, Ricardo verified them one by one... For example, in the 96 European Cup, although "Chicken Essence" could not remember those details, the many penalty shootouts and the final German victory were all verified.

(Voiceover: For the time being, let’s call these extra memories that are not memories “chicken essence”. This term was also told to little Ricardo by the memories that are not memories)

And the Asian financial crisis in 97! This changed Ricardo's life. He began to believe!

These "chicken essences" continued intermittently until July 2024, 7, in the luxury suite of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in the City of Angels, USA, and another Chinese male who seemed to be named Li Qi was also taking a bath. It seemed that Li Qi had just attended a technology seminar. It should be the same hotel where Ricardo and his family stayed in 18. As for whether it was the same suite, and whether there was also only one boy like Ricardo's brother in the suite as a "hen" witness, neither of them could remember clearly...

Oh, yes, in this case “chicken essence” should be called memories from the future!

So, the other Li Qi is from the future, and he is definitely not the previous life or predecessor of Ricardo Li Qi; but the memory from the future also tells Ricardo that it is not Ricardo's future, because Ricardo is a native Italian with blond hair, white skin and very handsome; and the memory from the future is of a Chinese uncle named Li Qi (or Li Qido, I can't remember clearly...).

(Voiceover: Well, in my future memories, many young ladies will call me uncle...)

So this is the legendary soul travel, right? Um, is it the kind of soul travel that fails halfway? Oh no, it should be halfway successful... Anyway, science can't explain it clearly.

Let's call the owner or source of future memories Old Li Qi - it seems that only the memories have come through, and the main consciousness is still that of the Italian boy Ricardo Li Qi...

But let's not talk about it. As for this thing called subjective consciousness, who influences whom, who is influenced by whom, who is within whom, or who controls whom, and in the end, whose consciousness it belongs to? Who can tell for sure?

╮(~▽~)╭

…………

After a homemade Western breakfast, which was milk, bread, eggs, tomatoes, ham slices, and salad dressing, Ricardo prepared to go back to the training base to pack his equipment. After all, Barcelona won the championship two rounds ahead of schedule in the 04/05 season, so Ricardo still had some opportunities to play as a substitute in the last two rounds.

The training base of the FC Barcelona first team is located in the suburbs of Barcelona, ​​about 14 kilometers from the city center. It is called the "FC Barcelona Training Center", near the famous Camp Nou Stadium and not far from the La Masia Youth Training Base next to the Camp Nou Stadium. The two bases are located in the two directions of the Camp Nou Stadium, like the left and right guardians, guarding the glory and pride of Camp Nou and Barcelona.

The first team's training base is located in a large park. There is a huge training base covering an area of ​​40 hectares in the park, with 11 football fields, 4 basketball courts, 3 tennis courts, 1 volleyball court, 2 billiards courts, a standard swimming pool and a training center building. The core area of ​​the training base is the training center building, which has a variety of training equipment and multi-functional building facilities to meet the various needs of players during training...

After the players have finished their training, they can relax in the players' lounge and bathroom. In addition, in order to enable the players to obtain the best training results, the training center is also equipped with professional medical rooms, physiotherapy rooms, nursing rooms and massage rooms, etc., to provide players with a full range of physical examination and recuperation services.

While packing up equipment at the training base, Ricardo took the football and played for a while on the open training field with several second-team and youth team players, taking advantage of the good weather, as a warm-up for the World Youth Championship.

……

After packing up his equipment, Ricardo naturally had a free lunch at the club. After all, he was already here. Although the taste was not as good as Chinese food, it was free, so of course it was delicious, hehe...

After dinner, I took a short rest in the players' lounge of the training center. The training base was not far from the University of Barcelona, ​​so I could go back to school for classes in the afternoon.

Lying on the sofa in the club's player lounge, Ricardo closed his eyes and thought about the arrangements for the next few days: the afternoon class is software engineering economics, and the evening class is software engineering methodology; tomorrow afternoon's class is project management, and the day after tomorrow morning is practice and case study, all basic courses.

Between sleep and wakefulness, Ricardo was mumbling in a voice that only he could hear. It was unclear whether he was talking in his sleep or talking to the old Li Qi in his mind: "I discussed the assignment with the professor last week, and it's passed for now..."

"Oh yeah, I have to ask the professor for leave to participate in the World Youth Championship... Oops, I just forgot to ask the coach when the World Youth Championship will be held. I should be able to come back in time to take the final exam..."

"Also, when does the club close for the holiday?"

"What should I bring back to Milan? I also need to prepare some gifts for my parents; Ronaldinho and the autographs of the young Messi for Uncle Charles and Cousin Francis, a poster of a certain team for my brother Andre, an authentic Barcelona jersey for Sarafina, and Ronaldinho's autographed photo for the other friends..."

"Hey, for these dozens of autographed photos, I tried to get close to Ronaldinho's father a lot last season..."

"Well, yes, we also need to inform those good grandchildren that your dad will be back in a few days! Get ready to play games..."

……