The stars hung low in the night, and only the lights in the manager's office were still lit in the Dortmund building.

The computer screen shone with light and wrapped half of Yan Jing's face, and his hand controlling the mouse moved on the desktop, occasionally revealing the watch on his wrist, and the time displayed by the hands was almost 23:00.

Yan Jing started work three hours ago, and before he came to work, he had just finished a Bundesliga game with Borussia Dortmund.

Their opponent in this game is Bremen, who are currently in third place, and the gap between them and them has reached 14 points, which is basically a hopeless title race.

But the title race is clearly not the ultimate goal for Bremen, as they can hold on to their current position and secure a Champions League spot next season, while Bayern Munich behind them are only three points behind them and could be overtaken if they are not careful.

Although Borussia Dortmund are at the top of the table, Bremen's players are determined to pick up points and are not afraid of Dortmund's attacking firepower this season.

Borussia Dortmund, perhaps because everyone's attention was drawn to the Champions League semi-final in a few days' time, in which the Dortmund backline was in average form.

A mistake by Thiago Silva also allowed Bremen striker Klose to score a goal before the German centre-forward added a header.

Fortunately, although the back line is not strong, Dort's offensive line is still brave.

With Bremen trailing by two goals at half-time, Villa and Sneijder scored as they stubbornly equalised before the break to secure a point.

Meanwhile, on the other field, Stuttgart beat Kaiserslautern 1-0 at home.

As a result, the gap between the two teams in the standings has been reduced to the original 5 points.

Some media outlets are not optimistic about Dortmund's prospects and they are expressing their opinions.

With five points from four rounds, such a gap is not unattainable, especially considering that Dortmund are now facing a two-front battle, and two Champions League games against Manchester United are bound to take a lot of energy from the players.

While Dortmund haven't been winless for several games in a row so far this season, who can guarantee they won't collapse at the end of the season?

Come to think of it, they are so young, and only Thuram of the main 11 has had a Champions League semi-final experience – it was in the 2002/2003 season that Thuram was playing for Juventus when he reached the Champions League final with the team, but unfortunately lost to Champions League champions AC Milan on penalties.

Of course, after all kinds of slaps in the face for most of the season, the other half of the media believes that Yan Jing has the ability to lead Dortmund to win the Bundesliga championship.

They've all come this far, what do you still suspect? Do you think it should be more prudent to speculate on what miracles will actually happen? But in fact, a miracle is happening before our eyes!

According to the latest survey results of Bild, more than 62% of fans in a survey of 3,000 people believe that Borussia Dortmund will win the Bundesliga this season, while another 38% believe that Stuttgart will come from behind to reverse the result.

While the debate over where the Bundesliga title will belong will be for now, Yan Jing's main focus at the moment is of course the first leg of the Champions League semi-final against Manchester United four days later.

The sense of urgency forced him not to go home and rest after the game, but to return to the office to continue working.

Before Ulf moved back, he was happy to work from home, but since Ulf moved in with Auguste, the absolute cleanliness of the nights has disappeared.

This kind of excitement is good for Otliea and Ulf, but Yan Jing needs absolute silence when thinking about something important and complicated.

Yan Jing looked at the five formations he had summarized on the screen and the most commonly used starting lineup for each formation, and the many possibilities were overwhelming.

Manchester United's formation has never been consistent this season, and judging from the current footage, Ferguson has used at least five or more formations in order to rotate the team.

4-4-2, 4-5-1, 4-3-3, 4-2-3-1, 4-4-1-1, and a handful of other formations......

Among them, according to the number of occurrences, 4-4-2 and 4-5-1 are the two most commonly used formations of Manchester United in the league and the Champions League.

Manchester United's 4-4-2 is usually with Tevez and Rooney up front, but Tevez is more like a standard centre-forward, while Rooney is a little further down the wing.

Manchester United's midfielders, from right to left, are Cristiano Ronaldo, Carrick, Scholes, and Ryan Giggs, of which Ronaldo's position is at the front, close to Rooney on the other side.

The versatility of United's starting trio up front meant Ferguson could easily adjust his squad to suit his opponents.

In the quarter-finals of the Champions League, Manchester United was like C. Ronaldo at the front and Wayne Rooney on the left, beating Roma in two legs thanks to their excellent performances.

In the quarter-finals that had just ended, due to the increase in injuries at Chelsea, the right-back had to make a cameo appearance for Essien, and Ferguson switched Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Cristiano Ronaldo tangled up Michael Essien, who was playing a temporary cameo at right-back, down the left flank, and it was Ronaldo's aerial superiority over Essien that led to United's goal.

In a game, Ferguson can adjust the position of a player individually without affecting the entire formation, which can be very uncomfortable for the players defending them.

Ferguson's other habitual formation, 4-5-1, also highlighted the strength of the front three. Unlike their 4-4-2, the key feature of United's 4-5-1 lineup is that there is no fixed arrow.

Cristiano Ronaldo is a winger in principle, both technically and physically, he can threaten from the flanks, and of course he has the ability to be a firepower when needed – if it weren't for Franck Franchier's appearance, he would have been the brightest winger in European football this season.

The other two players in United's midfield, Wayne Rooney and Carlos Tevez, are not too tall creative strikers who like and are good at dropping back to get the ball and create chances for their team-mates.

At present, there are basically no injuries in the Manchester United camp, and Yan Jing believes that it is less likely that Ferguson will take the risk of using other formations with a full range of personnel.

But this is just to say that it is unlikely, not absolutely.

Even if it were to be bold to assume that Ferguson would decide between 4-4-2 and 4-5-1, it would be difficult to determine United's starting line-up.

United's front three are fairly harmonious, but not all three of them are always on the pitch.

Sometimes Ferguson wants to add a coolie midfielder – usually Park Ji-sung – and one of United's front three is sacrificed, and most of the time it is Tevez who is sacrificed.

Compared to Manchester United's diversity, Dortmund's formation is too one-dimensional.

Dortmund have used 4-3-2-1 for most of this season, and the benefits of this formation to Dortmund are self-evident, but after using them for too long, the routine will inevitably be familiar and understood.

Of course, Yan Jing believes that there are many people who understand Dortmund's tactics now, but there are definitely very few people who can come up with a strategy and have enough ability to execute the strategy.

Unfortunately, Ferguson happens to be one of those few people.

If you talk about the main starting 11 alone, Dortmund's midfield is definitely capable of competing with Manchester United, but if you compare the backline, it is slightly inferior.

It's not that Dortmund's defenders are bad, Manchester United have two experienced stars in their squad - Gary Neville and Rio Ferdinand, Dortmund's side Thuram is the same level of star as them, but there is still a gap between Derby and Neville.

Unlike strikers who make a name for themselves early on with talent, experience is so important to defenders that most experts believe that the golden age of a defender is after the age of twenty-six.

In addition to Neville and Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra also have more experience than Thiago Silva and Lichtsteiner.

It is impossible to avoid the fact that there is a gap between the two teams at the back, but he also believes that such a gap can be offset by the containment of the frontcourt players, but it will require more effort from the frontcourt players......

Yan Jing fell into deep thought for a long time, and suddenly his mobile phone rang with a text message prompt.

He calmed down, pulled back his thoughts, and touched the mobile phone with only one battery left on the desktop to see that it was sent by assistant coach Connell, and the content was only a short sentence, but Yan Jing was frightened by this huge surprise.

- Yan, in the Premier League game just now, Neville and Ferdinand were both injured.

Damn, really?!

Yan Jing's first reaction was to open the browser to find the news to confirm the authenticity of the news, and after seeing several authoritative media reports that Neville and Ferdinand were confirmed to miss the Champions League match, Yan Jing simply suspected that he had hit shit luck.

For a while, Yan Jing didn't know whether to feel that Dortmund was too lucky or Manchester United was too lucky.

The emotion quickly disappeared in Yan Jing's mind, and he restrained his smile with a serious expression.

With Rio Ferdinand and Ben Neville both injured, his previous set-up for United's backline has been in vain, and the defence will certainly affect Ferguson's line-up up front......

It seems that we have to think differently and start all over again.

Yan Jing took a deep breath, the sleepiness that had been brewing in his body for a long time was instantly dispelled by this news, he took the notebook and pen and stood up to the tactical board behind him, and pasted one magnet after another representing the players on the field.

If Wayne Rooney is wide open on the left, the midfield will form a relatively narrow five-man line, and Ronaldo will be the only striker......

was too focused on tactical thinking, Yan Jing didn't even notice that the mobile phone on the desktop automatically turned off because of the lack of power, and only cared about writing and drawing in the notebook.

As a perfectionist, Yan Jing wanted to be as detailed as possible, and by the time he finally figured out the specific ideas about tactics down to each player, the time had come to half past two in the morning.

Outside the window has long since changed from quiet to silent, Yan Jing's eyelids have long begun to fight frantically, and he doesn't know when he will be defeated.

But Yan Jing didn't plan to rest yet.

He hopes to convey his tactical thinking to all players from tomorrow, and he certainly can't show his unstructured notebook to the players, which will increase the burden of understanding on the players.

Yan Jing yawned and sat back in the boss's chair, created a new ORD document, and began to sort out the contents of the notebook one by one and record them into the computer.

By the time everything was done, it was already four o'clock in the morning.

Yan Jing couldn't think of anything else, he forced himself to save it mechanically, and then the last consciousness ceased to exist.

He fell asleep on his desk. 166 Reading Network