Chapter 394: Welcoming the Year of the Dog
In the 63rd minute, Udinese, desperate for an equaliser, was a little too aggressive, and even the centre-backs pressed through the half, but the pass from Brazilian Samir Caetano was pre-spotted by Silvestri, who intercepted the ball on the way with a covert and quick tackle. The right wing-back of Torino immediately sent a through pass forward, and after Belotti, who also withdrew to his own half to help the team's defense, got the ball, he rushed forward with an acceleration, and he saw a large open field in front of him, which made the red babe, who was not very good at long-distance dribbling, find Henry's feeling, and he could sprint and sprint again.
Although Samir, who had made a mistake in the previous pass, had been stubbornly chasing back, his speed ability was not too outstanding, and he could only follow closely behind the Torino No. 9 and could not interfere with him substantially. When Belotti dribbled through fifteen meters in front of the midfield line, the Dutch central defender Nuudink, who stayed behind the team, also made an irrational choice. It took Nujdink a second or two to stop by inertia because he rushed up so hard, and by the time he turned around to speed up the chase, the home team's scorer was almost in the box.
At the top of the arc of the away team's penalty area, Samir, who was running empty, finally caught up with Belotti with the ball. Faced with the extremely dangerous situation that he was the last player in the defensive line, the former did not dare to make a foul easily, but naturally bumped the left shoulder of Red Beibei with his body, hoping that the opponent who was in a high sprint would have an unstable center of gravity, so as to lose the rhythm of his feet and be unable to make dribbling or kicking the goal in a short period of time. In this way, Pisari, who is already ready to attack, has a chance to control the ball. And the visiting team's central defenders have a very delicate scale, this time the physical contact is very natural, and the force is not great, under normal circumstances, the referee should not blow a foul. And even if a foul is blown, the place of the accident is outside the penalty area, and the opponent will not be given a penalty, leaving a glimmer of life for the team.
To be able to think of such a reasonable plan and implement it in a flash of light, I have to praise the 23-year-old Brazilian central defender is very unusual, in reality, the potential of 158 Samir Caetano has indeed entered the list of Li Mudi's key concerns, which can make the discerning Torino coach look at it, fully proving the player's development potential. But in front of Belotti, who has developed into at least the world's second-class striker in the past two seasons, the former is now a little less powerful and experienced.
I saw that the red beibei, who had no time to look back at the situation behind him, felt that the left side was gently squeezed by the opposing player, and immediately made an instantaneous action to fight against it, and then used the opponent's thrust to take a big step to the right front, which not only stabilized his center of gravity, but also got rid of Samir's close interference, and also created the space and angle to attack the goal directly. He calmly fired a diagonal shot into the bottom corner of the far post, and the ball hit the pre-conceived target with great speed against the turf, almost grazing the inside of the post and into the net. Pizzari's dying and struggling fall to the ground was naturally useless, and he could only lie on the ground and accept the loss of the city gate for the second time today.
After witnessing the miracle of Belotti, who is better at grabbing points, actually ran 60 meters with the ball alone and smashed the Huanglong's successful goal, the entire Olympic Sports Stadium was boiling, and almost all the home team fans on the scene stood up from their seats and shouted loudly to vent the excitement in their hearts. Even Li Mudi was stunned with an incredulous expression, and then hugged his girlfriend and joined in the joy of the people around him. Although there may be many people who can score this kind of goal, it is indeed too rare for a center forward of Belotti's type, and it is estimated that it will be difficult to repeat today's feat until he retires.
The score became 2-0, and the momentum of the Udinese players was severely damaged, and the offensive momentum that seemed to be played at a super level was never repeated. Coach Otto also didn't seem to have any thoughts about earning points today, and around the 70th minute, he made two substitutions to bring off the central midfielder Yankto and Behrami off early. Samfield also made personnel changes according to the plan, and young players such as Manuel Pellegri and Bonifazzi also got playing time, although the European opponents in midweek were weak, but they still need to make the most adequate preparations if possible, and after the victory was confirmed today, they began to carry out the retention operation.
However, the Red Bulls, who were dominantly playing at home, scored again before the end of the game, and Immobile, who led the scorers' charts, stabbed in front of goal in the 87th minute to set the final score at 3-0, helping the team to taste the wonderful feeling of victory again after the last round of broken streaks.
However, Li Mudi and his family did not see the goal with their own eyes, as the group had left the field early five minutes before that. Because they didn't have to attend the post-match press conference, and most importantly, they needed to rush to Milan to attend the second Chinese Spring Festival Gala, so they braved the harassment of reporters waiting outside the stadium and took the car driven by Forsina with the help of the stadium staff, and directly embarked on the road to the Turin-Milan highway.
By the time he arrived at the Miranda Weimar Theater, where he had received the Friendship Medal from the Chinese in Italy, the time had already reached eight o'clock in the evening, and the party had already begun for a few minutes. Fortunately, it had been expected before, Li Mudi and others entered the theater under the leadership of the organizers, and sat in the few VIP seats closest to the side door as low-key as possible. The Torino manager's show was also scheduled for the latter part of the evening, leaving him plenty of time to prepare.
The excitement of this overseas Chinese Spring Festival Gala is obviously far less than the authentic one in China, even if the latter has become a common "Tucao Conference" for the people of the whole country, but the various singing and dancing programs performed by some not widely known "artists" and even ordinary people on stage are obviously enough to remember for overseas wanderers. Peking Opera and Henan Opera, which are art forms that have hardly attracted the attention of many young people in China, have been warmly welcomed abroad, and when a first-class actor from a Peking Opera troupe in China sang a piece of "Master Horse, Look at it closely", the theater hall that can accommodate more than 2,000 spectators resounded with long-lasting applause. Later, "tears at sight" aroused the longing feelings of many wanderers, which made a lot of low sobs in the venue.
Later, the eldest sister Ni Ping, who is familiar to the Chinese people, also appeared to perform a poem recitation, although she is nearly sixty years old, and she has rarely been on the screen in recent years, but her sensational skills still maintain a strong level, and once again earned a lot of tears from the audience, even Li's father and mother were not spared.
The evening also invited several famous local Italian singers and bands to assist in the performance, but unfortunately the Turin coach did not know any of them, so he used the time to adjust his condition. To be honest, his singing level is just above average KTV level, and it is more than enough to entertain himself when he closes the door, but it must be a little insufficient to see it on a formal occasion. So I have always been very unconfident in my heart, and as the appearance time approached, the nervousness gradually rose, and cold sweat broke out. After Lin Yun'er next to her found out about her boyfriend's situation at this time, she hurriedly whispered a few words of comfort and encouragement, and when she got backstage, there was the guidance of the choreographer of the party and Sister Ni and others who did not leave, so she completed the song "My Chinese Heart" with trepidation, which can be regarded as completing the task in a decent manner, without shame.
After the whole party, on the grounds that the parents were old and needed to go home to rest, they politely declined the invitation to have dinner together, and with the gifts of the consulate staff, the sponsors of the Spring Festival Gala and representatives of Chinese organizations, the family took the car driven by Forsina and returned to Turin overnight, ending the activity of congratulating many compatriots for the New Year.
After the video of the party was transmitted back to China, it also received a certain amount of attention, not only with a total of more than 20 million hits on the Internet, but also recorded and broadcast by CCTV 3 and overseas channels, which received a good response. What's even more strange is that Li Mudi's barely qualified singing voice has been affirmed by many fans, and he even proposed on the Internet that the authentic Spring Festival Gala program team also invited him to come back and sing a song. The reason is also very simple, the Spring Festival Gala is all lip-synching, with the real singing skills of the Turin boss and then the later revision of the software, it is not much better than those little fresh meat.
However, this proposal will naturally not be realized, not that the Spring Festival Gala program team does not agree or has not been reviewed, with Li Mudi's current status in the domestic sports world, naturally there is no need for rehearsals. Even if it is the Chinese New Year's Eve airborne party, a little bit of trying on stage can be directly inserted, and the director hopes to get such attention. But not to mention whether the Torino coach is willing to participate in this increasingly boring large-scale spit show, it is impossible in terms of time alone. On Valentine's Day on February 14, the 29th day of the Lunar New Year of the Celestial Empire, the Torino team will travel to the city of Razgrad in the southeastern Republic of Bulgaria in the Balkans to face last year's champion Ludogorets in the first leg of the Europa League 16 finals.
On paper, this opponent is indeed the lowest level of the team in the knockout stage, but their performance in the group stage had to make the outside world look differently, beating Turkish powerhouse Istanbul and Bundesliga upstart Hoffenheim to qualify, and almost finishing first in the group, which is a reminder that the Red Bulls should not be careless. The Torino boss was obviously not in the mood to pay attention to the rest of the things after a busy day, and he returned home in the middle of the night after a brief wash and went back to his room to sleep, and the next day he woke up at six o'clock due to the influence of his biological clock, so that he had time to check the results of the other league games in this round first.
There were no upsets on the weekend, with the favourites achieving a favourite result as Inter Milan finally ended their miserable eight-game winless run with a hard-fought 2-1 win at home to Bologna, barely retaining their chance to qualify for the Champions League in pursuit of Torino. However, the two teams are still seven points apart, and with only 14 games left in the league, the Nerazzurri still need to find their hot form at the beginning of the season in time, otherwise it will be difficult to successfully counterattack.
On Monday, the Torino team did not have a regular break, and with the exception of players who had played more than an hour the night before, who had chosen to make adjustments, the rest of the squad began to prepare for the game. In order to minimise the occurrence of injuries, Li Muddy is still ready to make a big rotation in the midweek European game. The two-legged format and the home-and-away schedule gave him the confidence to preserve some of his core for the more important city derby at the weekend.
After arriving in the city on Tuesday night and following a warm-up and acclimatisation, the Red Bulls kicked off a copy of the Europa League knockout rounds on Valentine's Day afternoon. It is worth mentioning that the Tianchao CCTV Sports Channel also purchased the broadcast rights of this event after many years (it was not bought during the group stage), and also appointed reporters to go to the scene for interviews and reports, bringing a new experience to domestic fans when the Year of the Dog is approaching.
Before the game, Li Mudi accepted a brief interview with his compatriots, and he said that he would do his best to strive for victory and present a New Year gift to the Chinese people in advance. However, his tactical arrangement was to focus on defensive counterattacks in the opening stage, and the main players such as Benassi and Immobile were also missing in the starters, which made supporters feel a little lacking in confidence. At the beginning of the game, it was true that the home team took more of the initiative, their 4-2-3-1 formation and the tactical idea of fighting for more possession made people vaguely see the shadow of Barcelona, and many foreign players from Brazil in the team were also very distinctive in their individual skills, and once really created a lot of threat to the away team's defense.
However, the decline in the overall level of football in Bulgaria has led to Ludogorec, the country's league champion team, whether it is the head coach or the players, there is a big gap with the teams of the top European powers, even if the Torino team is not first-class at the moment, but at least it is the leader of the second group of Serie A, and the home team does not need to use all their strength to teach the home team a good lesson.
Taking advantage of the opponent's eagerness to score at home, Li Mudi has already made a plan to deal with it, first using a solid defense to deplete the morale of the home team's players, and then seizing the opportunity to use the possible gaps on the two wings to form a quick counterattack, and the offensive end will never drag the mud and water, and strive to send the ball into the opponent's penalty area in the shortest possible time. In the 30th minute, it was Faebas's cross from the right that allowed Belotti to show his ability to grab the ball, and Red Bebe opened the door to victory with a powerful header, while increasing his total goal tally to seven in the tournament and continuing to lead the scorers' charts.
Ludogorets had to invest more in attack in order to keep their hopes of progressing alive, which allowed Torino to continue their counter-attacking tactics and scored twice in the second half, a penalty from Gourcuff and a header from Manuel Pellegri. The 0-3 final match basically made the suspense of this round of matchups disappear completely, and Li Mudi also kept his previous promise, allowing domestic fans to bid farewell to the Year of the Rooster with a hearty victory and ushered in the arrival of the Year of the Dog.