The Chinese tennis player, whose personal situation alerted the sports world, received The Team on the sidelines of the Beijing Olympics. She maintains that her life has not changed.
Peng Shuai is fine. Anyway that’s what she hammered at The Team , the first foreign and independent media to have been able to exchange with the Chinese tennis player, a time reported missing after having evoked a sexual assault by a senior dignitary of the ruling party. “I never said anyone sexually assaulted me“, argued the 36-year-old Chinese, who spoke for an hour with two reporters from the French daily, on the sidelines of the Beijing Games.
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The former world number 1 in doubles received the daily which had dedicated a front page to him on November 20, where the slogan “Where is Peng Shuai?” was visible in a hotel in Beijing. If she took the opportunity to thank the messages from her colleagues on the ATP and WTA circuit, the Chinese assures that she “didn’t think there would be such concern“. Before continuing:and I would like to know: why such concern?»
Towards the end of a career?
“Relaxed” according to the journalists present, and dressed in a sports outfit in the colors of her country, Peng Shuai, who is due to meet for a second time with Thomas Bach, the IOC President, maintains that she has “never goneand having had no problem with the Chinese authorities, suspected of having silenced him following his revelations. “With my close friends, I always stayed in close contact, I chatted with them, answered their emails, I also chatted with the WTA… That’s why I don’t know why the information that I had disappeared spread.”
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My life is as it should be: nothing special…
Shuai Peng, in an interview with L’Equipe
Asked about her life since November 2, the date of the revelations, the Chinese replied that she was “as it should be: nothing special…“On the other hand, her life as a tennis player has come to a complete stop, and this since … February 21, 2020, i.e. before the pandemic. “The sudden arrival of this pandemic has rendered all our projects null and void. We are all undergoing this pandemic which represents a huge challenge», Regrets the ex-world number 14.
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Operated several times, Peng Shuai is approaching a forced and forced end of career. Even if it is the object of greed emanating from the circuit, and in particular from the French Nicolas Mahut, who invited him to come and play Roland-Garros in mixed doubles next May. “When is it?, she smiled, before evoking a retraining … among seniors. Among the professionals, the level is very high, it’s too fast for me. It would be a very big pressure, because I know you have to be very fast. The demands on the sporting level, the responsiveness, the capacities are all very high. I believe that I can only integrate a team of seniors after my retirement.”