On the evening of June 29, at the Estadio de Recifebe, Nambuco, Brazil.

In the fourth match of the knockout round of 16 of the World Cup, China played Costa Rica.

When the game reached the 36th minute, Costa Rica cleared the ball at the back and kicked the ball directly near the halfway, and Feng Xiaoting pressed the opponent's forward header back.

The veteran captain Zheng Zhi was suspended because of the red card, and the defender Wu Xi was qualified to start, and formed a three-midfield with Zhou Haibin and Chen Tao.

As soon as Zhou Haibin received the ball, he immediately distributed the ball to the left side.

The starting left fullback Jiang Zhipeng quickly sprinted forward along the left side, after receiving Zhou Haibin's ball, he watched the situation in front of him, faced the Costa Rican players who came up to defend, and after a false shot, he suddenly rushed forward, and after opening up a little distance, he made a 45-degree diagonal pass on the left side with a large arc with his left foot.

Jiang Zhipeng's diagonal pass was directly aimed at the back of the goal, and in the penalty area, Yang Yang also shook off the Costa Rican defender at the fastest speed in an instant, quickly sprinted forward, grabbed before everyone, faced the falling ball, and lightly cushioned the ball with his right foot, directly to the left side of the goal.

Costa Rican goalkeeper Keylor Navas flew to the right side to block the near corner, but he didn't expect Yang Yang to deliberately hit a far corner, which made him unexpected, and wanted to block it with his feet, but as a result, Yang Yang's foot pad shot was a half-high ball, and he played very smart.

Eventually, the ball flew into Costa Rica's goal.

1 to 0!

The whole Pernambuco stadium was boiling!

Thousands of Chinese fans who had made the trip cheered and sang the national anthem in the stands.

Yang Yang turned around excitedly, ran all the way along the way, pointed to the Chinese fans in the stands, and finally slipped to his knees on the sidelines.

……

The first half ended with a one-goal lead, and after the second half of the rematch, the Chinese team continued to maintain a steady and steady tactics.

Costa Rica's offensive efficiency throughout the first half was extremely low, and they didn't even shoot at the goal, but even so, the Chinese team still didn't dare to be careless.

Yang Yang, who wore the captain's armband, kept repeatedly reminding his teammates that they must pay attention and pay attention again.

Stay focused!

At the same time, he is also actively looking for opportunities.

In the 51st minute, the Chinese team launched another attack, Jiang Zhipeng stepped forward on the left side of the attack, and after Hao Junmin took the ball on the left side of the penalty area, he did not cross the ball, but pulled the ball back and crossed to the front of the penalty area.

Yang Yang stopped the ball with his right foot, pulled his leg with his left foot and shot angrily, and directly pumped the ball into the lower left corner of Costa Rica's goal.

Navas reacted quickly and flew away, but in the end, he couldn't reach it.

Two to zero!

……

In the 66th minute, Costa Rican defender Aduult committed a foul while defending Yang Yang, accumulated two yellow cards, and was sent off with a red card, which made Costa Rica have to fight with one less man.

At this point, the suspense of the game has basically been lost.

In the end, the Chinese team defeated Costa Rica 2-0 with Yang Yang's brace.

Both teams are defensive and play more averagely, but Yang Yang's two goals are more beautiful.

After defeating Costa Rica 2-0, the Chinese team entered the quarterfinals of the World Cup for the first time!

……

As soon as the game ended, not only the thousands of Chinese fans who came to the Pernambuco Stadium were boiling, but also the whole country in China in Asia was jubilant, countless fans cheered wildly, and fans in major cities couldn't help but take to the streets to cheer for the performance of the Chinese team in Brazil.

This is the first time in the history of Chinese football!

This is another breakthrough in the World Cup!

Although this is not the first time that an Asian team has reached the quarterfinals of the World Cup, as early as during the World Cup in South Korea and Japan, South Korea and Japan have achieved such results, and even South Korea has reached the semi-finals.

But everyone knows where that report card came from, so no one wants to mention it.

But the Chinese team reached the quarterfinals this time, but it lived up to its name and relied on real strength and performance.

From the group stage to the knockout stage, the strength of the opponents is indeed not strong, but like Colombia, Ivory Coast, Greece and Costa Rica, they are also frequent participants in the World Cup and strong teams.

Among them, Costa Rica beat Uruguay, Italy and England to top the group, if this team is not strong, then what are these three traditional strong teams that have won the World Cup?

Domestic fans and media have praised the national team, especially Yang Yang's performance.

Since Brazil drew 1-1 with Chile in the round of 16 knockout round, but beat the opponent on penalties, Neymar did not score, so Yang Yang currently overtook Neymar and Messi with five goals and topped the World Cup scorer list.

This also made countless fans cheer for Yang Yang.

In the other three matches played in the round of 16, except for Brazil's 1-1 draw with Chile but a penalty kick defeat, the Netherlands reversed Mexico 2-1 with goals from Sneijder and Huntelaar after conceding one goal first.

Colombia beat Uruguay 2-0, and the midfielder James Rodriguez, who has quickly become popular at this World Cup, scored twice and achieved an impressive result, while he also made James Rodriguez famous with Yang Yang for the top scorer with five goals.

But in the midst of the jubilation, there is also no shortage of doubts.

Both Asian teams and East Asia, Japan and South Korea have always regarded China as mortal enemies, and in recent years, China's achievements have improved by leaps and bounds, and the emergence of legendary superstars like Yang Yang who can go down in the history of world football has made them even more blushing.

In this World Cup, Asian teams except for China can be described as completely wiped out.

But when they returned from the World Cup, they heard the news that the Chinese team defeated Costa Rica 2-0 and entered the quarterfinals of the World Cup for the first time, which made them envious and jealous, and their domestic media had all kinds of remarks.

For example, the Chinese team is Yang Yang's one-man team and the like.

And the most unified statement is that the Chinese team will stop at the quarterfinals.

Both South Korean and Japanese media firmly believe that China will face the Netherlands in the quarterfinals due to the Netherlands' defeat of Mexico, so it will be difficult for China to go further and will stop at the quarterfinals, which will match Japan's achievements in the South Korea-Japan World Cup that year, but be inferior to South Korea's semi-finals.

The media of both countries have listed a lot of data and evidence, showing that the Chinese team is all-round backward in the face of the Netherlands, and has no chance of winning, because the Dutch team is the runner-up of the last World Cup and the team that almost won the championship.

Sneijder, Robben, Van Persie, Kuyt...... Even players such as Huntelaar and De Jong are all well-known European stars, and coach Van Gaal is also a coach who has been famous in Europe for many years, and he is extremely familiar with Yang Yang.

What's more, Alihan has coached the Chinese team for many years, and the Chinese team is deeply influenced by Dutch football, so in the eyes of the Korean and Japanese media, this is a bit like a student being tested by a teacher.

But students are only students after all, whether it is the overall strength or the individual ability of the players, it is difficult for China to compete with the Netherlands.

The bearish remarks from Japan, South Korea and Australia, as well as the media around the world, have made domestic fans feel dissatisfied, and even in China, there are many voices that the Chinese team has no chance of winning against the Netherlands.

"Even if we have Yang Yang, the world's No. 1, even if we are tenacious, the gap in strength is huge, which cannot be made up in any case, and stopping in the quarterfinals is a satisfying, even surprising result."

And on the evening of July 5, the quarter-finals at the Estadio Nova Shuiyuan in El Salvador, Brazil, seemed to confirm the widespread view that China was powerless to fight back.

…………

…………

Almost from the very beginning of the game, the Chinese team was fully controlled.

Captain Zheng Zhi made a comeback to start, and the Chinese team once again played a four-five-one three-back formation, with Wu Xi, Zheng Zhi and Zhou Haibin in the midfield, and Hao Junmin and Chen Tao on the wings.

Queiroz's formation had only one purpose, and that was to defend it to the death.

From the first minute, the Dutch team kept attacking the Chinese team's goal.

Sneijder, Robben, Kuyt, Vlar, De Jong, and even Van Persie, who had a good conversation with Yang Yang before the game, changed their faces at the beginning of the game, and all of them attacked the Chinese team's goal with a vicious look.

Yang Yang retreated into the 30-meter zone from the beginning of the fifteenth minute, which shows how much offensive pressure the Chinese team is under.

Queiroz discharged the team's iron bucket-like defensive tactics, and even to some extent, under the strong offensive pressure of the Netherlands, the Chinese team did not even have a chance to counterattack.

Everyone in the team gritted their teeth and persisted, while the Dutch team kept creating chances and creating threats.

The situation on the field is one-sided, the Chinese team's penalty area is noisy, and the goal is crumbling, but everyone in the team is gritting their teeth to support, and even Yang Yang has returned to the penalty area many times to defend, which shows how passive the situation on the field is.

But even so, the first half was tied 0-0.

The Dutch were more or less cautious and did not dare to press too hard.

But in the second half, the situation changed again, and Van Gaal began to invest more in attack.

The Dutch won back-to-back free-kicks, and Sneijder came close to scoring with two direct free-kicks in 15 minutes, one hitting the left-hand post and the other hitting the crossbar.

The extremely passive scene made the Chinese players extremely painful on the field, everyone gritted their teeth and persevered, and everyone stood in and out of the penalty area, blocking the opponent in front of the goal.

From the beginning of the 70 minutes, Van Gaal made substitutions, replacing new forces, and injected fresh blood into the attack, but the Chinese team still guarded strictly and never moved half a step easily.

At this moment, everyone really felt the transformation of Queiroz's defense against the Chinese team in the past four years, especially the cultivation of the players' tactical literacy.

And this finally helped the Chinese team block the indiscriminate bombardment of the Dutch.

Ninety minutes later, the two sides went into extra time 0-0.

In the first half of extra time, the Netherlands changed two players in a row and continued to increase the attack, and the Chinese team also continued to defend strictly after changing one player, and finally successfully dragged the score 0-0 into the second half of extra time again.