It's still the community park, it's the lush meadow, it's still the friends who have played football since childhood.

I haven't seen him for more than half a year, Lu Jiang, a little fat man, has lost a lot of weight, but his body is more robust and powerful, his speed is still not too fast, but every interception and scramble is extremely fierce.

However, after all, Qin Goode has been training hard for two hundred days among a group of black and hard Europeans, and his physical confrontation ability has already surpassed his domestic peers by a large margin, even if there are two people on the opposite side, he can often resist calmly, and he can even drag a defender to shoot with his feet.

"You calf, you don't look very big, why are you so strong?" Lu Jiang crossed his hands on his hips and panted slightly.

"When you were a child, you were asked to eat more beef and drink less coke, but you've never heard of it, and now you know it's amazing, right?" Qin Gude patted his thigh and brought the football out of the door.

This kind of small competition of about a dozen people is no stranger to Manchester City, and he has never been afraid of confrontation, and with the level of these partners, this kind of competition does not have much value for him to improve. What he lacks most now is the experience of official competitions.

"Yesterday I heard you were going to be in the first team?" He fiddled with the ball with his left and right feet as he looked around.

"Hey," Lu Jiang shrugged, "Do you think the coach has taken a fancy to my talent and promising future?" ......Not yet," he rubbed his fingers, "and it's just training with the first team, so there's no guarantee of playing time." "The two have been friends since kindergarten, and they know the situation of both parties well, and they rarely shy away from these things.

Qin Gude could only sigh slightly-

After watching the Asian Cup, Qin Gude followed Sun Jihai back to England to start training for the new season.

Sun Jihai played for a whole season at Manchester City, in the league, FA Cup, League Cup, national team games, he played more than 45 games in the fourth line, and he did not encounter an injury for more than a month, which is really a miracle for him who has reached the age of 30.

However, after playing three group games for his country, he actually strained his thigh in the last game and was replaced early, and after more than half a month of recovery, he was able to board the plane as scheduled and catch up with the team's pre-match training.

Qin Goode did not see Sturridge in the U18 youth team again, while some other teammates from last season withdrew from the academy due to conditions that did not meet professional requirements, personal interests and other reasons, or chose to return to normal schooling, or directly entered the society to find work; And with the growth of the U15 players, some fresh blood has been injected back into the U18 team, and he has also seen many unfamiliar faces.

Most of these teammates are white and strong, black and hard types, or at least desperate Saburo who can't run to death, and there are few players like Sturridge who are good at dribbling and technique, fortunately, in the past few months, Qin Goode has strengthened the exercise of physical confrontation, so as not to be bullied too badly by those players who are younger than him, but Rao is so, in the face of these tall local teenagers, he is still inevitably knocked on his back and on all fours.

But his heavy artillery shot was also sharpened in such fierce pressing: whether on the right or in the middle, as long as he entered the first 10 meters of the penalty area, once the marking was a little slower, he dared to resolutely take a long shot.

Not only is his long-range shot powerful and fast, but he is also quite accurate, and even if he is saved by the goalkeeper, he often bounces far away, creating a second chance to scramble, which has forced coaches such as Frankie Byrne to start taking his tactical role in the team as a whole seriously.

What's more, before this season, former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra moved into Manchester City strongly, and both the first team and the youth team thought that with the arrival of the new owner, maybe the club would hang an Asian whirlwind.

With the official opening of the Premier League on August 8, youth leagues at all levels have also kicked off.

The England Under-18 Youth League has a total of 40 teams, divided into two major divisions, the North and South divisions, which are further divided into two groups, followed by a home-and-away round-robin match, with each team playing two home and away matches against nine opponents in the same group during the season, in addition to a match against 10 teams from another division in the same division, which means that there are at least 28 rounds of matches in a season. The four group winners advance to the final semi-finals, where they battle each other to determine the winner.

On August 18, Manchester City U18 visited Vicarage Road Stadium to challenge Watford U18, and the visiting team from afar gave the home team a blow at the beginning: two goals in ten minutes, and by half-time, the score was already a dazzling 5-0!

Watford's players were almost knocked to the ground by the harsh reality when the opposing coach replaced his disheartened defender and young goalkeeper in the second half, conceding two more goals in less than 20 minutes, while Manchester City's Under-18 coach Frankie Byrne sent a couple of substitutes onto the pitch with a big swing.

Qin Good, who had been sitting on the bench for nearly seventy minutes, put on the battle and stepped on the turf happily, because of excitement and excitement, he even felt a little fluttering when he ran.

However, he has played a few games in the first half of the year, but he has not been weak, and after a few passes with his teammates, he quickly got into the game and began to try more to get the ball and break through.

Anyway, the opposing players had fallen into a state of numbness and sluggishness, and all 11 retreated, almost watching them fall to the ground in midfield and organize the attack.

"Andrey!" Qin Gude raised his hand to the back waist who was following him to ask for the ball, the other party grinned, and with a slight push of the arch of his foot, he received the football very comfortably.

The moment he got the ball, the closest defender to him was at least five metres away......

So he took a step forward with the football, and then he opened the stance: his left foot supported his whole body, his right leg was rounded back, and then it was a merciless heavy artillery!

There was no reservation in this burst of shots, the ball barely spun in the air, and hung in a lightning-fast arc into the corner of the goal, and the young substitute goalkeeper only symbolically waved his hands, then gave up resistance, and even sat directly on the ground, without even having the strength to turn his head.

The defenders standing in the shooting route reflexively gave way to a passage and let the football whizz by, and no one made any blocking moves.

Qin Goode patted the Manchester City club logo on his chest vigorously and waved his fist at the coaches outside the field.

Few of the coaching staff, who had no worries for a long time, didn't even raise their butts, just nodded and applauded at him to congratulate him. Then they will turn their heads away and continue with their light-hearted daily chat......

The demoralized home team had no way to fight back, but the visitors showed no mercy to the host, and after 90 minutes, the final score was fixed at 9-0, and Watford's two young goalkeepers even hugged their heads and cried, especially at the end, Qin Good's two-footed cannonball-like shot on goal scared the substitute goalkeeper almost incontinent on the spot.

After a good start, Manchester City's U18 boys became more and more courageous, directly played a wave of 11 consecutive wins, and successfully reversed the city's rivals Manchester United U18 with a score of 4-2 in the seventh round.

It wasn't until the 12th round that they stopped their winning streak when they were beaten 3-2 by home team Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park. However, this small defeat was insignificant, and City are already eight points clear of second place in the North League table.

And after a short break, the lads embarked on a winning streak, and in this group, they were completely irresistible!

However, at the level of young players, future stars such as Gareth Bale and Sturridge, who have made it into the first-team squad before the age of 17, rarely play at that level for long periods of time, are of a very limited level, and the impact is negligible compared to the Premier League and European competitions, even the Manchester derby, which has only 3,000 spectators in front of the stadium - and almost completely free.

However, even in such a game, Qin Goode still could not occupy a starting position, the main reason is his fitness and confrontation ability, in England with a long crowd there is simply no guarantee that he can play the full 90 minutes of intense games.

So he further strengthened his physical fitness and endurance training, in addition, after going to school and training, he chose to run back to the Sun family's mansion with the ball, and he deliberately changed the speed to run.

In mid-November, Sun Jihai suddenly told him: "I'm going to go back to China in a few days, do you have anything to bring with your family?" ”

Qin Gude was slightly stunned: "Go back to China now?" ”

"It's a cooperation project between the club and Shenhua," Sun Jihai's expression did not change, "three young players have been initially selected in Shenhua to come to Manchester City for trial. ”

"Tryout?" Qin Gude thought about it for a long time, and in his impression, Sun Jihai never met another fellow countryman in the Manchester City team...... It can't be that history has changed, right?

Sun Jihai shook his head self-deprecatingly: "But with Manchester City's vision and level, they will not train young players for China, but more to develop the domestic market." ”

A week later, Qin Gude learned the names of the three young players from his mouth: 22-year-old forwards Gao Feilin and Mao Jianqing, and 19-year-old goalkeeper Wang Dalei.

In Sun Jihai's words: These three people are basically good, and they all have their own advantages, but if they enter the Manchester City team, without a year of training and adaptation, they don't need to consider entering the squad at all......

Mao Jianqing is extremely fast, but the ball sense is average, and it is difficult to take the ball and dribble under fierce confrontation after rushing; Gao Feilin is not afraid of confrontation, he can take the ball in the confrontation, and his ball control skills are also good, but his speed is slightly slow, and his shooting accuracy still needs to be honed; As for Wang Dalei, a goalkeeper...... When have China's goalkeepers ever gone abroad?

And...... And labor certification!

Qin Gude finally realized a terrible thing.

Without a labor certification, you will never be able to go straight to the first team of Manchester City!