On the night of July 28, the Chinese women's soccer team beat Haiti in the group stage of the World Cup by a tiny margin of 1-0. The victory was as precious as gold for them, not only winning three valuable points, but also preserving the flame of hope for advancing to the knockout stage.
However, the game was full of twists and turns for the Chinese women's soccer team. In the first half, Zhang Rui was sent off with a red card for improper action, leaving the team one player short. In the second half, Zhang Linyan stepped up to the plate and broke into the penalty area with the ball, creating a penalty kick opportunity. Wang Frost calmly put the ball into the net, which was the only goal of the match. In the end, the Chinese women's soccer team won a hard-fought victory in the face of adversity.
After the match, Wang Frost was named the best player of the match, but Zhang Linyan, who created the penalty kick, also performed excellently. It is worth mentioning that Zhang Linyan, two minutes after Wang Frost scored a penalty kick, entered the penalty area with a strong breakthrough and was knocked down by an opponent, but the referee did not award a penalty kick after VAR intervention.
At only 22 years old, Zhang Linyan, who stands at only 1 meter 54, shows the core potential of the future of Chinese women's soccer. Cultivated by Evergrande Youth Training, her growth story is full of legends.In 2016, she unfortunately fractured a bone while participating in a U16 match and was unable to walk for more than four months. At that time, Messi personally sent her a signed jersey to encourage her to recover soon. This secret was not disclosed for the first time until years later, when Zhang Linyan helped her team win the championship and her father made it public for the first time in an interview.
Even lesser known is the story of Zhang Linyan and David Beckham, who in 2013 asked Beck for advice on how to maintain her mindset in competitive sports on the Football Night program. At the age of 12 at the time, she had the ambition to lead China's women's soccer team beyond Sun Wen's era, and dreamed of winning the World Cup with China's women's soccer team.
