Chapter 433: Keep Moving Forward
Dick likes to be in the limelight, and setting a record is a good gimmick to be in the limelight, but Dick knows that there must be a premise for creating a record, that is, there must be corresponding results to do the foundation - the previous record of ten consecutive wins in Serie A, the winners all won the Serie A championship that year, and in the next year or two in history, Roma once created a new record of twelve consecutive wins, but failed to win the league title that season, which made their record gold content drop a lot, It wasn't until Inter Milan won an unprecedented seventeen consecutive wins and won the league title that year that the new record was more convincing.
In the final analysis, recording this thing is just icing on the cake, not fundamental, with a record of champions, it will be thicker and more convincing, and if there is no champion alone, it can only be a record.
So externally, he seems very high-profile, but internally he tells the players that only when they win the championship, the record will be meaningful, otherwise, it will not be meaningful at all, Inter Milan will have two consecutive games in a week, and the last two months of the season have reached the stage of sprinting, and there is no need to have too many thoughts about the record that has not yet arrived.
The weekend's opponent is Bologna, which is not a very strong opponent, and Dick is still ready to use this league game to practice his new tactics, Adriano does not know if he will be able to return from injury before the game against Juventus, and there are still three games to play before that, two league games and a League Cup, which can be used to practice new tactics.
Juventus have now been knocked out by Liverpool in the quarter-finals – Dick's words have come true, but it has also allowed Juventus to focus on the league and the test is now really beginning.
Inter Milan is still one point ahead of Juventus, five points ahead of AC Milan, there are nine rounds left in the league, and Udinese, who is now in fourth place, also has a sixteen-point gap with AC Milan, basically retaining the fourth place, and qualifying for a Champions Cup is the most important thing they need to do now, and finally sprint to the league championship this season, it is still only the top three in the north!
At a time when the two teams of Roma began to degenerate, the top three of the north, continued to begin to dominate Serie A.
On April 10, in the thirtieth round of Serie A, Inter Milan challenged Bologna away, AC Milan hosted Brescia, and Juventus challenged Fiorentina away.
Of the three opponents, Brescia is now at the bottom of the table with 26 points, but it is not without hope of relegation, Fiorentina is 15th with 31 points, and has not yet come out of the relegation zone, only two points ahead of the relegation zone, Bologna is highly ranked, they are in seventh place with a goal difference - but they only have 38 points, and there are two teams with the same score as them - in fact, just look at Siena with 29 points in the relegation zone, You know how terrible the relegation of Serie A will be this season, twenty teams, and when it is close to thirty rounds, there are still fourteen teams that are not in danger of getting out of relegation!
In this game, Dick continued to line up exactly the same starting line-up as in the last UEFA Cup, while Bologna's performance was much faster and more tenacious than Vienna's, they used a solid defense to resist Inter Milan's attack, and Inter Milan was not in a hurry in attack, began to control the midfield more, gradually advanced, and then intended to score goals in positional battles - this approach is more difficult in Serie A, but Dick must implement such an approach, rapid attack can become fundamental, but in many cases, In the face of more and more iron buckets, this kind of attacking method will become an important means for Inter Milan to grab points.
Toney did not disappoint Dick, under such a tactic, he got the full play, after the previous performances, Toni has proved that he has the ability to become an important scorer for Inter Milan, at this time Dick made him the main force of Inter Milan, and no one has any opinion on this.
In a giant like Inter Milan, even the head coach does not say that whoever plays the main force will let whoever plays the main team, especially before Toni came to Inter Milan, he was unknown, and his reputation is small compared to other players, at that time, there will be many people who are not convinced to let him play the core, and Adriano is different, after all, his performance in Serie A in the past few years is in the eyes of everyone, Vieri is gone to rebuild around him, others will not have any opinions, at this time, Pushing Tony into the attacking mainstay will make no difference – that's the status that comes with Toney's twenty or so goals in all competitions so far!
Under his back and forth in the penalty area, Bologna's backline quickly became a little overwhelmed, after all, Toney's height is a huge threat to all defenders, and now is his most mature time, the run, confrontation and shooting sense in the box have reached a peak, if it weren't for this, he would not have been able to create a miracle of 30 goals in a single season in the next season in history!
In the 31st minute, Zanetti, who inserted the assist, received Perrotta's ball and sent a cross with his left foot that was not too high, but Toni grabbed the first to attack the goal before the opponent's defender cleared the ball!
Old goalkeeper Pagliuca couldn't stop the ball from flying into Bologna's goal, despite his save!
Pagliuca also looked a little helpless about this header, if he could be five years younger, maybe he could react a little faster, maybe he would be able to save the ball, but now......
After being scored by Inter Milan, Bologna wanted to launch a counterattack, but they soon felt the huge pressure, Inter Milan is now a thicker midfield than before, and the running ability is stronger than before, under the interference of the midfield, Bologna's attack was not smooth, and finally barely completed an attack, and the game was taken over by Inter Milan again.
They didn't attack as many times as before, but the pressure on Bologna was much greater than before, and under such pressure, Bologna had little space to create better chances, but were constantly pressed into their own half by Inter Milan's attack.
Cruise scored another goal in the second half - in this goal, he showed a completely different character from Toney, although he is also a tall striker, but he is more technical, he is rarely seen to score violent goals or anything, and the big man of 1.89 meters is often able to pass lightly - he is not quite the same as Ibrahimovic's technique, more concise, but still the standard technical flow.
Stankovic sent over the top in the midfield, Toney grabbed a header at the edge of the penalty area, Cruise took two big strides in front of the opposing defender into the penalty area, picked up his right foot and feigned shooting, when the opposing defender desperately pounced to block, he quickly buckled the ball to the other side, shook the last defender, and then decisively got up with his left foot and volleyed vigorously in the penalty area!
The ball flew into Pagliuca's goal twice and the goal came in the 70th minute of the game, and after scoring this goal, it was almost certain that Inter Milan had won the game!
Before the end, substitute Recoba scored again with a direct free kick, 3-0, and Inter Milan beat Bologna at home!
After three draws in the previous four league games, Inter Milan did not panic when they were chased by Juventus to only one point, and they stubbornly won two consecutive victories to maintain their advantage in the standings!
In the other game, Juventus failed to bite Inter Milan tightly, they played a 3-3 draw with Fiorentina who fought for relegation in a goal shootout, in order to stay in Serie A, Fiorentina's performance was crazy, they scored two goals in the first half, and after being equalized by Juventus, they took the lead again with Dainelli's header, if it wasn't for Ibrahimovic's brace in the 82nd minute, Juventus would have suffered a defeat on the road!
However, this draw also stretched the points between them and Inter Milan to three points again, and AC Milan beat Brescia to narrow the gap with Juventus to two points, and now the battle for the top three seems to be getting more intense......
In midweek, Inter Milan ushered in the second leg of the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup, due to the previous three-goal lead on the road, Dick did not play in this game, all the substitutes were given the opportunity to play, Inter Milan finally beat Rapid Vienna 1-0 at home, 4-0 on aggregate to reach the last four of the League Cup - none of the other three teams are from the top five leagues, namely CSKA Moscow in the Russian Premier League, AZ Alkmaar in the Eredivisie and Sporting Lisbon in the Portuguese Super League knocked out La Liga's Villarreal, Premier League's Newcastle and Ligue 1's AJ Auxerre respectively to reach the semi-finals.
In the semi-finals, Inter Milan will face CSKA Moscow, where they will face their opponents at home and then on the road – the away game is on May 6, which is considered a bit of luck against the Russians, at least they don't have to play in the snow and ice......
'Inter are making strides towards the treble – they are now three points clear in the league, they are in the last four of both the UEFA Cup and the Coppa Italia, and in Dick's words, they are 14 games away from the treble – eight league games, three UEFA Cups, three Coppa Italia...... What kind of point will this amazing coach take Inter Milan to? Let's wait and see! Will it break Inter's fifteen-year curse of failing to win the title, or will it fall short? Inter Milan has buried a lot of famous coaches in the past, will Dick be the exception? ”
Many people are skeptical, after all, Inter Milan has also been infinitely close to the league championship many times before but fell at the last moment, this precedent has a great impact, but for Dick, this kind of influence does not seem to exist.
He is now just leading the team to continue to move forward towards the ultimate goal - in the 32nd round, Inter Milan will challenge Juventus away, which will be the biggest test for Inter Milan and Dick!
In the 31st round, Juventus beat Lecce 5-2 at home, Appia opened the scoring, and then Ibrahimovic scored a hat-trick, Nedved put the icing on the cake, and Juventus temporarily tied Inter Milan's points.
Dick was not affected in this way, under his command, Inter Milan swept Cagliari 4-0 at home thanks to goals from Perrotta, Toney, Cruz and substitute Martins, Adriano came on as a substitute for twenty minutes, and the performance was acceptable, and Inter Milan continued to lead the standings with a three-point advantage!
Three days later, the game will be a decisive battle between the two sides!