The day after a hard-fought qualification to the first round of the Coppa Italia, Torino did not take a break and regrouped at the training ground to make final preparations for Sunday's derby. Although everyone knows that the current strength gap between the two teams is still very large, and the Red Bulls' recent form is still very bad, while the old lady has been successful on both fronts in the past month, leading the standings in the domestic league with a four-point advantage, and the Champions League group stage is also early to ensure the first place, but the unexpected loss to Genoa last weekend is a bit of a fly in the ointment.

The only favourable factor for Torino right now is that Sunday's game is their home turf. The only time the Red Bulls have won in the last 22 seasons has been at the Stadio Olimpico, in the 32nd round of the 2014/15 season, when Torino beat Juventus 2-1. On the other hand, in the last four seasons, the two sides have met nine times, including a Coppa Italia match, and the Old Lady has an absolute advantage of 8 wins and 1 loss, and aside from that only defeat, Juventus are no worse on the road than on their own home turf. Especially on March 20 this year, they won 4-1 here, and the previous win at Juventus was only 2-1, so the home advantage of the Red Bulls does not look so obvious.

In addition, Torino have a cup game in midweek, but it is full of rotational players. The Old Lady also played in the final round of the Champions League group stage in midweek, but they also played at home, and most of the main players were rested after ensuring the top spot in the group in the previous round. So in terms of player fitness, both sides are half-pounded, and no one is at a disadvantage. So after analyzing and analyzing, it will be found that in the case that all external factors are basically in balance, it still depends on the ability and on-field status of the players of the two teams, and this is precisely Juventus's side has a great advantage, so it is no wonder that the bookmaker has opened odds of 5.17 for the home team to win and draw 3.62 and lose 1.65 for this Torino derby.

However, two days before the start of the game, there was exciting news from the Torino club: the team's number one star Belotti has renewed his contract. At 5 p.m. on the evening of December 9, an impromptu press conference was held in the press room of the Olympic Stadium in Turin, where President Urbano Cairo and Belotti himself sat on the rostrum and signed their names in the presence of many journalists. Later, the director Pantario Longo announced the details of the new contract: the end time is until 2021, and the annual salary is 2.8 million euros before tax, that is, 1.5 million euros after tax; The terms of the award are 15 million euros for loyalty, 10,750 euros for appearances, 8,000 euros for goals and 2,700 euros for non-appearances. Finally, there is the most important add-on, which is the €100 million release fee that only applies to foreign teams.

Although the media, especially transfer expert Di Marzio, has previously broken the news that Belottti's new contract will contain a very valuable liquidated damages clause, but after 100 million euros, which exceeds the value of Higuain and Ronaldo at the time of transfer, has really been confirmed, it still caused everyone's exclamations, which is a level that only Pogba has reached before! However, no matter how much the media hyped up this figure, the fans of Turin were extremely excited, after all, the club did not let go of the core of the team as easily as before, but happily paid a lot of money to keep it, which shows the ambition of the club's hierarchy to achieve good results, and everyone has a vague hope for revival.

With the renewal of Belotti's contract, Li Mudi and his colleagues found that the state of the players seemed to be stimulated by this good news, and the state had stopped declining, but rebounded to a certain extent, which is really unexpected! So after considering the situation of both sides, the Torino coach still made the tactical decision to fight for the midfield, control the ball at his own feet as much as possible, and not give the opponent too many opportunities to attack.

The reason why they gave up the counter-attack when they beat Roma and Fiorentina in succession was because Juventus's midfield control was too good, Pjanic and Dybala both had super individual dribbling and playmaking skills, and even the tandem role of Marchisio and Khedira should not be underestimated, so letting them control the ball to their heart's content in midfield would definitely be a big problem. Torino's backline doesn't have the ability of Genoa to stay focused for long periods of time and not make mistakes easily, and Li Mudi feels that in his current form, he can concede less than two goals in the face of the opponent's onslaught, which is considered a pass. Therefore, it is still necessary to contain them at the source of Juve's attack, and not allow the opposing striker to easily get a good opportunity to face the Torino defender in the danger zone.

In Saturday's training, Li Mudi once again gave a detailed analysis of the technical characteristics of several midfielders on the other side, so that the players should be targeted when fighting, so as to reduce the risk of eating cards and bring greater threat to the opponent. According to assistant coach Sumfield, it is safer to play a double midfielder, and put Akwa and Wives, two defensive midfielders with excellent interception ability, in the starting line-up, so as to cause problems for Juve's possession.

However, this proposal was vetoed by Li Mudi at the first time, the team has used the tactic of double back several times before, although the protection of the back line is indeed very good, but in turn it is a huge damage to the attack of the side. If only one of the playmakers in midfield, Basselli and Benasi, the opponent would be easy to mark, which meant that Torino's attack would have to be handed over to two wingers for individual attacks, and Belotti would have to fight the defenders in the box. This trick can still have an effect on the average team, but it will be a piece of cake for Juventus, which has one of the best defensive abilities in the whole of Europe. Therefore, the midfield must have two points of attack, and the defensive end can only rely on everyone to increase their running and limit the opponent as much as possible at the cost of consuming more energy.

Just after the Torino boss decided on the starting line-up for the game after much deliberation, it was the afternoon of December 11, and the players were ready to step onto the turf for a final warm-up after a short break after lunch. At this time, Li Mudi ushered in a rare free time, he had no appetite for eating, just simply ate a small sandwich and then returned to the locker room to swipe SNS with his mobile phone, and he still had about forty minutes of personal time before attending the press conference. Originally, he was going to say something in the restaurant to motivate the loss, but the Torino coach felt that his current mood was a little too nervous, for fear of affecting the mentality of the players, so he hid alone, trying to relax as soon as possible, otherwise as the coach of the team, he is in this state, can he still expect the players who are fighting with the opponent to the death on the field to put down their burdens?

Although most of Li Mudi's friends in China don't pay much attention to football, because the CCTV sports channel carried out high-intensity publicity on this derby as early as half a month ago, everyone more or less knows that today is a very important day for him, so friends in the entertainment industry represented by Zhang Yixing and Song Qian have left blessings to the Turin coach on the Internet. However, in addition to the messages of these "laymen", Li Mudi is more interested in the attention of some friends in the circle, and the support messages of Qizu and Raul and others are the norm, but the blessing of the wolf king Toti seems so special.

Ahead of the Turin derby, there have been three Serie A matchups in the current round, with Lazio and Napoli both taking three points away from home, and they are just one point behind Roma, who are set to beat AC Milan tomorrow night. It seems that the Red Wolves are feeling the pressure, so after the previous hopes of the pursuers were dashed, they can only hope that Torino can stop the league leaders, because if Juventus win and Roma lose, the gap between the two sides will widen to seven points. Coupled with the fact that the Old Lady will play at home against the Red Wolves in the next round, the former has a very good chance of winning, and once the result turns out as expected, it will basically announce that Roma will withdraw from the league title race, so today, Totti is on the side of Li Mudi and his team, cheering for the Torino team.

The unexpected interaction is not limited to this case, Juventus's defensive stalwart and the absolute main force of the Italian national team, Leonardo Bonucci, also tweeted the Torino coach, and the two have just become friends. Bonucci's youngest son, Matteo, fell ill at the end of July and was taken to the Queen Marguerite Surgical Hospital in Turin where he was rescued from danger after surgery. However, the opponent will not play in today's game, because in the away loss to Genoa, Bonucci strained his left thigh muscle in the 33rd minute of the first half, and was directly carried off the field.

However, not being able to play does not mean that he cannot "demonstrate" to his good friends before the game, and the Juventus central defender sent a photo of him holding his eldest son Lorenzo in tears on Instagram, when he was wearing a black and white striped shirt, while Lorenzo was wearing a crimson jersey. The latter is a die-hard Torino fan, and his favorite player is Belotti, so he usually "opposes his father" at home, and this photo should be the product of a joyful "rebellion". Bonucci's additional message reads: "Once again, red left helpless tears in front of black and white. The Torino coach then replied: "In ten years' time, the person who cries will not be Lorenzo Jr., so wait and see." ”

The image and the bickering between the two sides spread all over the Internet in a very short period of time, attracting a large number of melon-eating people to come and see the excitement, and the fact that the father is a Juventus player and the son is a Torino fan became an anecdote, leading to the topic of the complex relationship between European families and football, which is beyond the scope of this game. However, after seeing these blessings and "provocations", Li Mudi's mood did improve a lot, and his mentality finally calmed down, so he went to the news media room with a relaxed face, ready to meet the reporters' inquiries.

Although the time of the game is at 22 o'clock on Sunday night in the Celestial Empire, it is not very suitable for fans to watch, after all, they have to get up early to go to work the next day, but due to the effective publicity, the media estimates that there will still be more than 90 million Celestial Empire fans in front of the TV and the Internet to watch the live broadcast of this game, which will once again set a new viewership record for a single game in Serie A this season. Therefore, there are still many media reporters from China at today's press conference, and large units such as CCTV Sports Channel, Penguin Sports, and Xiaoshi still sent the number one football reporter to fly over in person, which shows the degree of attention. However, even if they barely make up one-third of all reporters, it has not changed the situation that everyone is unanimously not optimistic about the home team, and almost all the questions are asked under the condition of "Juventus are strong, how can Torino get a chance to survive".

In all fairness, the home team's results have far exceeded the outside world's expectations before the start of the season, even if they just lost to the second rival Sampdoria in the last round, but they are still in fourth place in the standings, even if the results of all the games in this round of the league are not good for the Red Bulls, they can hold on to seventh place at worst, which is still higher than the 10-12 places previously predicted by the bookmaker and the media, plus the performance of the teams behind is very average, and the polarization is serious, so unless there is any big change in the back, Otherwise, it will be difficult for Torino to fall out of the top nine, which is quite good no matter how you look at it. However, it is clear that the impression left over from many years of history, as well as the comparison of the form of the two teams in the recent period, still makes everyone think that it is difficult for the home team to bargain in front of the sworn rivals in the same city, and in addition to Li Mudi's compatriots, less than 10% of the media expect them to get lucky to get a draw, which is indeed a bit big.

No, the reporter of "Milan Sport" asked very bluntly: "Coach Li, the competitive form of the Torino team in the last two weeks is very bad, especially in the games against Samp and Pisa, it is obvious that the players have not been able to find their original control and rhythm. But how do you deal with this extremely unfavorable situation against Juventus today? ”

"It's not started yet, so no one knows what's going to happen on the pitch and I never thought Juventus had any better players than us. As for the tactics that Torino will adopt today, do you think I'll say it here? Will you believe it? So, go see for yourself when the time comes. The Torino coach didn't want to talk nonsense, so he coped with it in just two sentences.