On the second match day of the quarterfinals, Li Mudi once again sat in the broadcast seat of Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium, and together with the famous CCTV host Hong Gang, he became the live broadcast commentary partner of the host Russia and the favorite Spain.

For his second country, the Torino coach is still very optimistic about the start of the World Cup, although after two consecutive World Series slumps in South Africa in 2014 and France in 2016, after Lopetegui took office, the newly formed Matador team still showed the strength of the world's top team.

Although the team has not been able to break into the top 10 of the FIFA rankings for four years due to their previous results, Julen Lopetegui has led this group of players to play artistic football that everyone admires. On the basis of the previous coaches Aragonés and Bosque's emphasis on Barcelona-style passing, the young coach who played for Real Madrid when he was a player has integrated the fast-paced tactics of his old club into his own thinking, making the team's tactical style of play a type that is both threatening and enjoyable, and will naturally be loved and valued by everyone.

In the previously announced 23-man squad for the World Cup, Iniesta, David Silva, Ramos and Pique are four veterans, and top stars such as De Gea and Diego Costa are in their playing years, as well as the new generation of potential youngsters represented by Asensio and Saul, which just form a perfect personnel structure and are a typical championship-winning team configuration. Coupled with being drawn into a relatively easy group, and the possibility of avoiding the schedule of many strong teams once they qualify for the top spot, no matter how picky anyone is, they can't make a prediction that looks down on this team.

It's just that there are unforeseen storms, who would have thought that the Spanish Football Association would make a brain-dead decision to change the coach two days before the start of the game? Even in the face of strong doubts from the outside world, the team has always emphasized unity from top to bottom, but anyone with a discerning eye can see that the players' emotions have been seriously disturbed.

Another factor that affects the confidence of the outside world in this Matador team is the head coach Hierro, who was appointed in a desperate situation. His pale coaching resume, which has been mentioned earlier, is an amateur just looking at his on-the-spot reflexes in the three group games, and the coaching staff doesn't seem to have made much of a difference.

Of course, the team's poor performance is not only the interim manager and his team's pot, but also the sluggish form of the backline led by the world's top central defenders, Pique and Ramos, especially the current world's number one goalkeeper David De Gea. Having conceded five goals in three games, it is obviously a bit too whimsical to rely on such a poor defensive performance to advance to a further stage or even win the championship. And the problem in midfield is not small, we will analyse it later.

Looking at it like this, it may be difficult to expect them to win the Gold Cup again after eight years. Li Mudi felt that Croatia, who eliminated Spain in the European Championship two years ago, was a strong obstacle, and in the semi-finals, it would be better if England met the soft-footed shrimp in the tournament, and if it was against Colombia, it would be difficult for Hierro to lead the team through that hurdle.

It's just that he never thought that in the first round of the knockout round, his second motherland would encounter such big trouble, and in the end, he was defeated at the feet of the host who was far inferior to him, which was really disappointing to him.

In fact, the collapse of the Matadors was called up before the game, and in addition to the fact that the side was at a disadvantage in terms of on-site support, Hierro had a lot of advantages in all other aspects, and Hierro actually thought about how to strengthen the defensive ability of the midfield, and replaced the starting position of the playmaker Thiago with Koke for this purpose, which was quite too weak. Moreover, the Real Madrid legend has also adjusted the formation, abandoning the previous team's usual 4-3-3 position, and discharging the 4-2-3-1, which is no longer popular, and the emphasis on the defensive end has been very obvious.

However, this is a knockout match after all, and the opponent is still the Russian team with the blessing of the host's halo, so it is understandable to adopt a strategy based on stability. However, other adjustments made by Hierro in the starting lineup have ushered in questions from many people, including Li Mudi. If the substitution of Nacho for Carvajal at right-back can be explained by the latter's lackluster form, then Iniesta's choice to sit on the bench and let Asensio, David Silva and Isco join the attacking duo up front is a bit inexplicable.

After the last two games against Saudi Arabia and Monaco in the group stage, it was widely believed that Spain's front line, although they maintained their usual delicate technique, lacked the impact and could not tear apart the opponent's defence through their positioning while having a lot of possession. Perhaps it was in response to this weakness that Hierro and his coaching staff made the decision to remove Xiaobai from the starting list, but Li Mudi disagreed.

The biggest problem facing this Spain team in attack at the moment is not the sluggish form of one individual in midfield, but the incompatibility of their tactics of emphasizing passing and movement with lone striker Diego Costa. Compared with the dynastic period of 2008-12, Thiago naturally cannot be compared with the master Xavi, and the other two veterans Xiaobai and Silva, although their physical fitness has long lived up to the courage of the year, but the technical ability is still maintained well, and the consciousness is even more refined than that year, on the whole, it is not too different from that year.

However, when the person at the front changes from a speedy and technical striker like Villa and Torres to an all-round center like Sheng Shi Meiyan, the whole team's attack will have a very obvious stagnation, because although the latter can complete the role of covering the ball players in turns, he is not good at creating direct passing opportunities for teammates after running smartly. As a result, Iniesta and others, who have a serious decline in their ability to run but still have the ability to deliver lethal passes, cannot exert their full energy on the field, and finally form a situation where they enjoy a super high possession rate, but rarely have the opportunity to send the ball to the opponent's dangerous area and help their teammates get an easy kick.

So when the game went about half an hour into the game, Spain took the lead early in the tenth minute with the own goal of the opponent's central defender Ignacevic, and the audience has been watching this team that may be the best at passing and controlling the ball in football history.

Faced with what appeared to be a 3-4-2-1 and 5-4-1 pair, the Spaniard's superb passing ability helped them gain 80% of the possession, but it was difficult to find a direct attack on Akinfeev's goal. The retreat not only wiped out Asensio's speed advantage on the counter-attack, but also greatly limited Diego Costa's space to maneuver, and the Atletico striker could not drop back to get the ball because he could not threaten with the ball like Cristiano Ronaldo, and in doing so, it would also deprive his side of their only bridgehead, so they had to endure hand-to-hand combat between the opponent's tall centre-backs.

The two Spanish wingers have also tried to send a few crosses, but in the case of Ramos and Pique's two central defenders without assists, the air supremacy is completely controlled by the Russians, and Isco and others are at most just fighting for the second landing point to complete an unreliable long-range shot, which is very inefficient.

In addition, Busquets and Isco also passed two through balls, but because the opponent deployed a large number of troops inside and outside the penalty area, they were either cleared by the defenders first, or because of the pursuit of speed and too much power, this attempt was also fruitless.

And from a personal point of view, Li Mudi also noticed that the Spanish team seemed to be more satisfied with the situation of leading by one goal, and did not rush to score another goal to lock the victory with the strong will, which made him inevitably slightly dissatisfied in the commentary process, and even more words with criticism.

Because the starting center of the Russian team is the tall and heavy Dzyuba and has no speed advantage at all, and the former Real Madrid veteran Cheryshev, who played well before, sat on the bench again today, so the Matadors actually need to guard against only two full-backs Samedov and Golovin, and it should be said that it is relatively easy to make targeted deployments. However, Hierro made the mistake of being overly conservative at this time, and did not direct his players to increase the investment in attack, so that the stalemate of the game was maintained until the mistake of his own defenders came.

In the 39th minute, Dzyuba hit Pique's raised hand with a header that was not too threatening in the penalty area, and the referee decisively awarded a penalty. It was almost as if Umtiti had given the Oceania side the penalty in the first round of the group stage between France and Australia. The pair, who partnered Barcelona in the middle of the back, made the same fatal mistake in more than ten days of a tournament, which is also a rare scene in football history.

Dzyuba took the penalty himself, bringing the two sides back on the same page, and the state of the game that didn't change much after that really baffled the Torino boss.

When they are ahead, Spain can also use their long possession to kill time, or completely grind the opponent to death, or force the opposition to attack aggressively to create another goal for their own front-court players. But when the score became 1-1, Hierro and his disciples acted as if nothing had happened, and still maintained the same rhythm but had almost no effect on the ball, which was too bizarre.

And after the opening 20 minutes of the second half, Russia used up three substitutions in succession, and this attitude of actively responding to the changes in the situation on the field was in stark contrast to the calm and relaxed attitude of Hierro's side, Li Mudi, who could no longer bear it, directly opened his mouth and lashed out at his old friend more violently. He bluntly said that the Spanish team is very weak in spirit, just a paper tiger, in which the coach did not fulfill his due obligations, so that those world-class players lost their original aggressiveness and fighting spirit.

The dominant side should have tried their best to win in the game, otherwise once they were dragged into extra time by the opponent, then the consumption of their physical energy must be an additional burden, and if they entered the penalty shootout, then the factors affecting the victory have little to do with the strength of the team, and it is by no means the result that any favorite team wants to see. So the Torino boss doesn't really understand why the Spanish players are still putting their feet on their feet in the central midfield area of their own side, and what the point is in this.

It wasn't until the 67th minute that Hierro made his first change, replacing Silva with Andres Iniesta, then Nacho with Carvajal and finally Costa with clever striker Aspas, at which point in the line-up was the team's theoretical most important starter.

After this adjustment, the Spanish team immediately got a good chance, but unfortunately Xiaobai's volley from the edge of the box was saved by Akinfeev, and Aspas's small-angle follow-up shot still failed to pass the Russian goalkeeper's ten fingers, but at least the team's attack became much smoother than before.

Unfortunately, despite the best resistance of the hosts, the matadors could not take even one chance to change the score, and after regular time, there was another half-time overtime like offensive and defensive drills, and the two sides finally had to use a brutal penalty shootout to determine the winner.

As a result, Spain, who have not been good at this game in previous World Cups (lost to Belgium in 1986, Ireland in 2002, and Kimchi in 2002, with a 1-2 win rate of only 33%), fell to the 12-yard line again, and lost to the host team for the second time since 2002. The third penalty taker, Koke, and the last to make his debut, Aspas, were the unlucky ones of the day, but the whole team became the sinners of the country, especially manager Hierro and goalkeeper David De Gea, who played the worst performance in history.

In the post-game comment session, looking at veterans such as Iniesta with sad faces, Li Mudi couldn't bear the depression in his heart and broke out happily. first criticized the conservatism of his friend Hierro and the players' unenterprisingness, and then suddenly pointed the finger at Lafayette and the president of the Spanish Football Federation, Rubyales, believing that the wanton behavior of the two people led to the sudden dismissal of the innocent Lopetegui, which directly buried this group of players who had the opportunity to create greater achievements, and also betrayed the trust of all Spanish fans.

Hong Gang, who is sitting next to him, is still a host of theme columns in his own industry, and even if he is a game commentator, he is more familiar with badminton, volleyball, curling and other sports. This time, as one of the five people who came to the World Cup site to comment on the CCTV Sports Channel, the relevant level can be said to be the most lacking, so he did not react in time to stop it, so that Li Mudi's controversial comments spread through the signal, although it was not a live broadcast error, but it also caused some bad effects.

Soon after, the words of the Torino coach spread through the Internet and were soon known by several people involved. Hierro was not dissatisfied with this, after all, his poor performance was obvious to all, and he was quite open-minded, and he did not have any dissatisfaction with the criticism of his friends.

However, the president of the Spanish Football Federation reacted less politely, and Rubiales identified Li Mudi as a keyboard warrior who has nothing to do with the Spanish national team and only has a negative impact on the team by talking nonsense below, and claimed that as long as he is in power for one day, he will never agree that such a person belongs to the Spanish football circle. His statement temporarily cut off the possibility of the Torino coach combining with Spanish national teams at all levels and many professional clubs, but Li Mudi also had no relevant plans at all, so he did not feel any inconvenience.

Only Lafayette's attitude gave him a headache. As the head of the world's number one club, the president of Real Madrid will not react to a coach's criticism in front of the outside world. But through the FM system, Li Mudi can clearly find that the personal relationship between the two people has suddenly changed from the previous harmony to indifference, which is really not good news. The grudge with the football bigwig, although it may not have much negative impact, is definitely a result that no one wants to bear, what a disaster!