Football: He suffered a broken leg at the start of the game, but partnered with Haaland!

May 16, 2020, Westvalen Stadium, Dortmund, Germany.

This place was once the most terrifying football mecca in all of Europe. The yellow and black wall that could hold 25,000 die-hard fans once produced a devilish roar that made the legs of all visiting teams go weak.

But today, the stadium is quiet, with only a few small birds chirping and foraging for food.

Due to public health control measures, the Bundesliga was the first to return to play, with all matches played behind closed doors. The media bluntly dubbed these matches without live spectators "ghost matches."

There wasn't a single real person in the south stand. Instead, it was covered with cardboard cutouts of people's faces. Die-hard Dortmund fans had paid to have their own headshots printed on cardboard and placed in their usual seats. From a distance, the scene was both impressive and eerily desolate.

Dortmund police had set up three lines of cordon outside the stadium early on, maintaining a tight security presence. All the fans could only stay at home in front of their televisions.

As the first major league to restart after a global shutdown of more than two months, broadcasters went on a bidding war. They crammed realistic virtual fan cheering sounds into the live stream and gave numerous high-definition close-ups of the cardboard cutouts in the South Stand.

The viewership ratings surged by 320 percentage points compared to usual. Fans from over 160 countries were watching the Ruhr derby on their screens.

Beijing time, prime time in the evening.

Inside the CCTV sports channel's live broadcast studio, hosts Duan Xuan and Tao Wei were dressed in sharp suits.

"Good evening, everyone! Welcome to the Bundesliga Round 26 highlight match, where Borussia Dortmund hosts their arch-rivals Schalke 04!" Duan Xuan's voice was high and clear. "This is the first match of the top five European leagues since the league was suspended, and playing in an empty stadium is definitely the ultimate psychological torture for the players."

Tao Wei quickly chimed in, "That's right. While we're warming up, let me mention a newly issued rule. FIFA has approved increasing the number of substitutions per match from three to five, but the total number of substitutions is still limited to three. Coach Favre's lineup tonight will definitely be interesting to watch."

The broadcast quickly switched to the starting lineup.

Duan Xuan spoke at lightning speed: "Dortmund are fielding a 3-4-3 formation. Goalkeeper: Bürki; defense: Akanji, Hummels, and Piszczek; midfield: Guerreiro, Delaney, Sun Yang, and Hakimi; attacking trident: Sancho, Haaland, and Hazard!"

When Sun Yang, an Asian face, appeared on the screen, Tao Wei's voice noticeably grew louder.

"Sun Yang continues to hold his position as a core starter! Just last month, he led our national Olympic team to win the U23 Asian Cup in Thailand, directly securing a ticket to the Tokyo Olympics. He also won both the Golden Boot and MVP awards in the tournament."

"He's back in the Bundesliga starting lineup now. His extreme hunger for the game and his speed of recovery are monstrous. Let's see if he can continue his dominance from the Asian Cup in the Bundesliga today."

At this moment, the television screen switched to the Westfalen players' tunnel.

Normally at this time, the roar from the south grandstand would have made the roof vibrate. But now the passageway was eerily quiet, with only the screeching sound of steel cleats scraping against the hard rubber mat, mixed with the suppressed breathing of a group of burly men.

Dortmund's vice-captain, Hummels, clapped his hands and roared, "Forget about who's outside! Standing here, we are Dortmund! Those Schalke scum are on the other side, don't hold back! Strip them of their clothes!"

After Hummels finished shouting, he consciously took a half step back and looked at Sun Yang, who had the captain's armband wrapped around his arm.

Sun Yang stepped forward. Having just returned from winning the U23 Asian Cup and then practicing the legendary skills of the veterans night after night in the system space, he exuded an irrepressible sharpness.

"Brothers, listen to me!" Sun Yang's sharp gaze swept over everyone. "It's been more than two months since we've played a formal match, so everyone's legs must be heavy. But Schalke's players are just as rusty! These guys will definitely resort to dirty tackles in a stadium without fans, and the referee will be lenient with his whistle."

Sun Yang raised his hand and pounded his chest twice: "Don't waste your energy on them. Let me handle the ball! Anyone who tries to play dirty, we'll crush them on the scoreboard!"

"Crush them!" the Dortmund Hornets roared, their eyes bloodshot.

Haaland stood at the very front, sporting a golden bun styled by Sun Yang himself, looking just like a Viking berserker who had just returned from a bloodthirsty rampage.

He turned to Sun Yang, grinning impatiently, "Yang, it feels like thousands of ants are crawling all over my legs. Tonight, just keep shoving the ball in front of the goal, and I guarantee I'll smash the ball and the goalkeeper to pieces."

"Take it easy on Haaland." Sun Yang put his arm around Haaland's broad shoulder, a cold smile playing on his lips. "Just focus on crushing those two center-backs, and I'll feed the rest to you."

The Schalke 04 players could hear it clearly from less than two meters away.

Midfield tough guys McKennie and Zelda stared at Sun Yang, their bulging cheeks twitching.

Schalke coach Cramer had given the order before the match. Without the backing of a formidable home crowd, Dortmund was a tiger with its teeth pulled. From the very first second, the entire team was to strangle Sun Yang, crushing the Asian midfielder with their bones and muscles.

Referee Deniz Eitkin blew his whistle.

A sharp whistle bounced through the empty stands. There was no tsunami of cheers, only the dull thud of the ball being kicked hard.

Schalke 04 kicked off, and Raman launched a long ball towards midfield. Harit received the ball and was immediately pressed closely by Dortmund.

In just three minutes, the brutal, hand-to-hand combat nature of Europe's most famous Ruhr derby was fully exposed.

Without the pressure of 80,000 fans' verbal attacks, Schalke 04's defensive actions became outrageously aggressive.

In the fourth minute, Sancho received the ball with his back to goal on the left wing and was about to turn when Schalke defender Todibo, like an out-of-control bulldozer, launched a flying tackle along the grass, sending Sancho flying like a sack of potatoes out of bounds.

Sancho screamed and crashed heavily onto the grass. The microphone amplified his cry of pain, broadcasting it around the world.

The referee ran over and only gave Todibo a few verbal warnings, without even issuing a yellow card.

In the twelfth minute, Hazard made a strong cut inside from the right wing, and McKennie delivered a hard shoulder bump from behind. Hazard rolled to the ground, but the referee surprisingly raised his hands to signal for play to continue.

A series of shameless physical battles shattered Dortmund's proud, fluid passing game in the attacking third.

On the sidelines, Favre angrily ripped off his mask and spat at the fourth official in a furious protest.

Meanwhile, Schalke's coach, Kramer, clapped his hands excitedly. This was his carefully planned tactic of bogging down Dortmund, using fouls to drag their technical style into the mire.

In the twentieth minute, the ball rolled towards the center.

Delaney was forced into a frantic state by McKennie and hastily passed the ball to Sun Yang.

That shot was so weak and powerless, it was like hitting a knife.

Schalke 04's chance, which they had been waiting for for a full twenty minutes, finally came.

Zelda and McKinney, like wolves that have smelled blood, pounced on Sun Yang at full speed from the left and right, completely blocking any way for him to turn around.

"Go! Break his leg!" Zelda roared, sliding down and sending gleaming steel spikes hurtling towards Sun Yang's ankle.

McKinney, relying on his bull-like physique, pressed down hard on Sun Yang's upper body, attempting to overturn him with brute force.

This is the most insidious ball-stealing trap. As soon as the ball is poked down, Schalke's three forwards can directly challenge Dortmund's defense one-on-one.

But Sun Yang didn't retreat even half a step.

The 5 points of dribbling attribute recently added by the system made his ball control incredibly smooth at this moment. Pirlo's grid-like, godlike vision was already fully activated in his mind, and he had complete control over the movement trajectories of everyone in the attacking third.

Haaland is being closely harassed by Sane. Meanwhile, Achraf Hakimi is making a run down the right flank with incredible speed.

Sun Yang's left foot sank into the grass, his lower body, honed by his system talent and Peking Opera training, was like the roots of an old tree. Facing McKennie's brutal shoulder charge, Sun Yang neither dodged nor avoided, but instead pressed the ball with the ball of his right foot and pulled it back sharply.

boom!

McKinney crashed solidly into Sun Yang's shoulder, but the scene he had imagined—the Asian kid falling flat on his face—did not happen at all.

Relying on his "Iron Legs" talent to absorb 50% of the impact force, coupled with the powerful core locked by Kant's perpetual motion machine lungs, Sun Yang managed to withstand the impact of this heavy dump truck.

The next second, facing Zelda's deadly spiked slide tackle, Sun Yang suddenly slid his upper body to the right at lightning speed.

Zidane's signature move: a shoulder drop feint!

The feint was so realistic that Zelda's body, which was gliding along the grass, was shaken and instinctively veered to the right.

It's just a gap of less than half a meter.

Sun Yang flicked his ankle in a strange way, and the ball was deflected by the outside of his foot in the narrow, suffocating space, and then snapped back with lightning speed by the inside of his foot.

He and the ball moved like ghosts, completely bypassing Zelda's tackle.

"Great shot!" Duan Xuan slammed his fist on the table in the studio, "Sun Yang was incredibly tough this time! He completely ripped the skin off two of Schalke's defensive midfielders!"

Once the double team was broken, the situation in front of Sun Yang suddenly became clear.

Schalke's proud meat grinder defense was torn open with a bloody hole.

Sun Yang raised his head.

Haaland, who was ahead, only glanced at Sun Yang's starting stance.

Without even waving his hand, the Norwegian behemoth with his hair in a bun shoved aside the center-back Sané, and his two incredibly long legs seemed to be powered by a motor as he launched a deadly sprint toward the open area on the right side of Schalke's penalty area.

The 100-meter sprint was at full speed, and chunks of grass were torn away by the spikes.

Sun Yang had no intention of stopping the ball to adjust.

He slammed his left foot down on the side of the ball, channeling all his terrifying power into the outside of his right foot.

Modric's godlike outside-of-the-foot technique, fully loaded and ready to go!

boom!

A thud that made your teeth ache exploded in the deserted stadium.

The ball flew at high speed, skimming half a meter above the grass, like a low-flying missile, its surface spinning dramatically counterclockwise.

Schalke's left center-back Nastasic desperately moved to the side, swinging his long leg to try and intercept the through ball halfway through.

Logically, the ball should have flown directly out of bounds.

But then, Nastasic's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets.

The high-speed spinning ball defied the laws of physics and changed course in mid-air, drawing an unreasonable S-shaped arc that just bypassed Nastasic's shoe tip and precisely cut into the most fatal blind spot behind Schalke's defense.

A track built exclusively for Haaland.

The ball seemed to have GPS tracking, feeding Haaland precisely onto the optimal sprint route.

You don't even need to adjust the slightest step.

Haaland strode into the penalty area, and the ball rolled perfectly to the point where he could most forcefully strike with his left foot.

Schalke goalkeeper Schubert was forced to rush out of his goal, spreading his arms like a desperate bear as he lunged at Haaland. Black defender Salif Sané followed up with a desperate sliding tackle from behind.

The goalkeeper blocked his view from the front, while pursuers tackled him from behind.

Haaland's eyes were already bloodshot. He didn't even think about slowing down or dodging. He let out a wild roar like a Viking beast and brutally swung his left leg to meet the incredible outward-spinning kick.