Chapter 108: Good Things Happen Again and Again
Falling behind by one goal is not just a matter of scoring two goals in a row to overtake the home team, but the advantage of away goals in two-legged matches has become even more important as the style of world football becomes more and more conservative. That means if they don't score against Madrid next week, they will be knocked out of the tournament with the same aggregate scoreline.
Ordinary people will inevitably feel very frustrated and even a little desperate at this time, but the head coach of the home team, José Maria Salmeron, is a battle-hardened veteran after all, from retiring in 2003 to becoming an assistant coach of the team, and then taking over the position of coach two years later, he has worked in the position of head coach for 11 years, and has gone through seven teams, which can be said to be very experienced. At this time, he was different and secretly congratulated himself that Wu Kangda was the home and away team in this round of the game, if he lost the away game first, what should he do if he returned to the home field and Castile played a defensive counterattack? When the time comes, people will send Mbappe and Alvaro two fast horses, and they will attack you with their speed advantage on your two wings, and no one should know how badly Atletico Balearic died in the first leg of the Fed Cup final. The current situation is naturally very bad, but after all, there is still room for redemption, as long as your own side can also break through the opponent's goal.
Although after the opening, Wu Kangda did not seem to pose any decent threat to the visiting Castilla goal, but through a large amount of information and on-site observation in the past 20 minutes, he has found some problems in the back line of the away team, and I believe that with the help of a little luck, he can still find a good opportunity to score.
After the restart, Li Mudi immediately noticed that the opponent's tactical details were different, first of all, their right winger Nono began to retreat frequently to participate in the defense, so he teamed up with Tezio to temporarily block Kuchi's activity, and this Jun's dribbling skills are also as high as 15, with his 16 flexibility, not inferior to anyone on the field in terms of personal ball control, once the activity area is no longer fixed to the original position, Kuqi's three-legged cat-like defensive ability alone has no way to take him. Seeing this, the visiting team's left-back Abner was gradually attracted to the situation, trying to use the content marked on the "small note" that he had memorized for a week to limit the opponent again, but the opponent could always move the ball away in advance and not give him a chance to play.
Secondly, Rubio, the forward of the home team, always does not stay honestly in the middle, and his running position is very erratic, just like Li Muddy used Kuchi as a free man in the front court before, so that the three central midfielders in charge of the area defense dare not press too high, for fear of being exploited by him.
Finally, it was Wu Kangda's centre-forward Parares who began to actively seek physical confrontation with the two central defenders, some of whom did not give up even if it seemed that he could not reach the pass at all, and always put pressure on the opponent, as if to test whether the defenders of the visiting team would make mistakes on the spot.
Just as the boss of Castilla was wondering if the opponent's adjustment had really seen his own fate, the home team launched a premeditated attack. Nono, who has not been hard with his opponent since losing the ball, suddenly appeared too sticky after receiving the pass from his teammates, and Kutch's tackling ability is really weak and sighing. At the moment when the Brazilian stretched his foot, the home team's right winger made a deft half-turn to take the ball out of the encirclement and pass it to the Senegalese Fao, who used his right foot as a wall to knock the ball near the midfield line on the right side without stopping.
Seeing that the left side of his side was empty, Peperu in the middle immediately rushed over to make up for the defense, while Toro, who was in the middle of the three midfielders, was pinned down by Rubio to the other side of the pitch, which directly caused a one-on-one situation on this side. Seeing this scene, Li Mudi shouted in his heart that it was not good. The 17-year-old Peperu is a typical all-round midfielder, with potential at both ends of the offensive and defensive ends, but he is not very good in any aspect due to age restrictions, and can be called "everything, but not fine", 12 steals, 10 defensive positions and 11 speed are at a comprehensive disadvantage in front of Nono, who has excellent personal skills. His specialty is a versatile player similar to Liverpool midfielder Jordan Henderson, who is just ordinary in terms of individual defensive ability, and the probability of being successfully snatched one-on-one by players with strong breakthrough ability is quite high.
It seems that the other party has really found our weakness, looking at Coach Salmeron who is standing on the sidelines and commanding the team, Li Mudi has to think with admiration.
As expected by the Castilla boss, Nono deceived the opponent's centre of gravity with three beautiful bicycle movements in a row, and then took the ball forward in a big stride, and the visiting centre-back Manu appeared again on his way on. The following plot Li Mudi has already made up in his mind: it is nothing more than that Manu, who is seriously inexperienced in the game, is passed by the opponent or shaken out of the ball line, and the opponent crosses with his feet, and the center forward Parares, who follows up in the middle, will use the characteristics of Leon's lack of aggression and defensive actions that mark him, and use his impact and extraordinary ability to create space, so that the opponent will be afraid of the emotion, waiting for the opportunity to complete the attack, and the rest will be handed over to Lady Luck, It's up to her to see if she prefers one of the two teams.
Fortunately, in this attack, good luck did not favor either side, and the final result was determined by their respective strengths, Parares's powerful shot in the box was saved by Yáñez, who has solid goal-line skills, and then was destroyed by Manu who returned in time to destroy the touchline.
After the dead ball was formed in the field, the Castilla coach came to the sidelines, called out to Kutchi, who was about to retreat to his own backfield to help the defense, and explained before and after he approached: "Tell Abnell and Forlan on the other side not to press the half court before half-time, and concentrate on staying behind to defend." On the offensive side, with the three in midfield switching to a triangular position, Toro and Peperou focused on defence, while Febas could step forward at the right time to pick up the attack. As for you, if you're caught between two on the right and it's hard to get out of it, move in the middle and disrupt their defensive positioning. After the other party nodded in understanding, and ran to his teammates to convey the latest deployment, Li Mudi once again moved his eyes to Coach Salmeron, who was also standing on the sidelines, since you have found our weakness, then you have to see the move, and try your best to make up for it at the expense of the attack. However, we have already had a goal in hand, even if we can't score again, but as long as we keep the goal intact, we can get out of the way, so how can the seniors break the game?
When it comes to Castilian's two main fullbacks, it is really the big brothers of the same team who have some of the same meaning, they are all full of factors involved in the attack, once they judge that there is a good opportunity, they will not hesitate to kill the opponent's half, and they can't wait to smash the Yellow Dragon. Wu Kangda just seized the gap on the left side of the away team and completed a threatening attack, so Li Mudi is now the first strong man to break his wrist and give up the defender on this side to insert the assist, so as to maintain the integrity of the entire defense line to the greatest extent, and then use the numerical advantage to limit the opponent's play, for a while the home team really has no good way.
Now the situation on the field is as follows: Franca Alvaro on one side and Gonggo Rabelo, the left-wing combination of the home team, form a mutual constraint, no one can take the advantage, basically there will be no variables; On the other side, the away team's defenders are no longer rashly involved in the attack, and Kuchi is another defender who can't stand it, so it's basically difficult to find any opportunities in pairs; After that, there are two central defenders, three midfielders and a striker, the two sides have the same number, and the Castilla side is even stronger in terms of ability, especially when every weakness of the home team's players is completely mastered by the opponent. In the end, it was concluded that while Castilla was focusing more on the defensive side, it would be too difficult for other teams in this division to win.
For Salmeron, a training coach who has more ability to adjust players than on-the-spot command, the situation he is facing now is indeed a headache, and he did not want to be killed by the opponent with a counterattack in Madrid a week later, so he adjusted his tactics at half-time and strengthened the intensity of the attack. Although before the end of the game, Wu Kangda still scored a lucky refraction from substitute striker Titti, but Mariano of the visiting team had already scored a beautiful header in the 77th minute, so the score of 1-2 still announced the defeat of the home team, and basically allowed Castilla to lock up the promotion place. After the game, facing Li Mudi, who pretended to be calm, Salmeron also laughed at himself: "Actually, it's good to lose this time, we can completely give up, and it's a good thing to be able to prepare for the other two promotion seats a week in advance!" In this regard, Xiao Li was neither in favor nor against, so he had to smile embarrassedly.
The joy of winning away from home naturally spread throughout the team, with Li Mudi making an exception to allow the players to wander around the city of Murcia in the evening, where they could play at any other venue except the bar. Although the boys complained that only the bar was still open at this time, they were still in good spirits, and after returning to the hotel, they ran outside in groups, and the matter of having fun will never be uninteresting for young people in their twenties.
The coach of the team did not immediately return to the hotel in the city with the bus, but found a restaurant outside the campus of Wukang University that looked good, and he wanted to have dinner with Sir Bosque and exchange ideas about football with each other (he was officially awarded the title of Marquis by King Juan Carlos I of Spain in 2011, which is hereditary, and the status is much higher than that of Lord Fernandes, KBE, or Lord of the Order of the British Empire). Originally, Li Mudi also wanted to take this rare opportunity to invite Xu Gengbao to come over, so that the two old people who have worked in football all their lives can have a good chat, maybe they can create some unknown sparks. Unfortunately, because he was still with a group of children, he had to rush back to Lorka overnight, and he couldn't stay here for too long, so Li Mudi regretted that he missed a good opportunity to witness a historic meeting.
Bosque first congratulated his successor who had been separated by N generations and almost locked up the second division, and then told him some of his own experiences with football stars, especially the emperor's superstars, under the humble advice of the other party. Dealing with people is Li Mudi's weakness, he is a little childish in character, and when he is in a good mood, he treats everyone with a pleasant face, but once the mood becomes bad, his words will be very straightforward, and he will not save face at all. In Castile, who are all kids, they can't make everyone like him, at least at the beginning of this month, using scouting tools, it was discovered that as many as three substitutes who usually don't play much have complained about him. Once you want to take over those giants with stars or even big names in the future, it is likely that there will be a crisis of internal instability. And in today's world football, the best at appeasing the emotions of superstars, so that they maintain high morale of the head coach is none other than the old coach Bosque, Ronaldo, Zidane, Carlos and other stubborn and even a little eccentric players are happy with him, it can be said that if it was not for the old coach at that time for the team's internal unity made a huge contribution, the "Galaxy Phase I" may have collapsed long ago.
After dinner, the two discussed the European Cup in a month's time, and although "Lord Bo" said that he was confident of achieving a good result, the Castile coach still sensed the worries in the other party's heart. Xavi is out, Cassie is getting old, and De Gea is coming to take over, but the former has never been able to find a new person to replace him. In addition, the problem of weak strikers and the tension between the players from Real Madrid and Barcelona's two sworn enemies make it difficult for outsiders to be optimistic about the future of this national team, and as far as the old coach expressed at the banquet, the 23-man squad will still be dominated by veterans, so the same tragedy as in the previous life seems inevitable. As a half-Spaniard, Li Mudi still feels very sorry for this legendary division that has dominated world football for three consecutive tournaments, after all, no one can stop the twilight of the beauty and the white head of the hero, and here can only send their most sincere blessings to them and the old coach.
Fortunately, the depressed mood did not last long, and on the way back to the hotel by taxi, he received a good news call from his friend Baozi, the crew of "People" has been officially completed, and the negotiations with CCTV are also very smooth, and the contract can be officially signed after Li Mudi, the big financier, agrees.