Chapter Twenty-Three: No Trick Wins
In the pre-match guess, Baggio lost the right to pick the first half, but Correspondingly, Brescia also won the first kick-off. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info
After passing the football back to Guardiola in the back position, Zhang Shu followed the figure of Toney and Baggio to the half of the Roma team.
Pep Guardiola did not hand over the ball to Zhang Shu for the first time, at first the Roma team still attached great importance to Zhang Shu, Emerson followed Zhang Shu to keep an eye on his movements, and the teenager De Rossi swept around the midfield, ready to cut off the football that Guardiola sent to the front.
In such a situation, Guardiola handed the ball to Matuzallen next to him, who led the ball to the front.
Eventually, Brescia's first tentative attack ended with a through ball from Matuzaren to Toni that was cut off by Samuel.
"Okay, Roma broke off the football, the two sides exchanged offense and defense, and now it's Roma's turn to attack." Fabio said. "Roma guessed the direction of Brescia's attack. Brescia didn't have a full-back today, and although Zhang and Baggio were on the line-up as wingers, they were actually positioned quite close to the middle, losing the ball on both wings, and Brescia's attacking line seemed a bit monolithic. ”
Not only him, after the start of the game, almost everyone saw the running position of Baggio and Zhang Shu at a glance.
Fabio was a little glad that he didn't question Mazzoni's line-up on TV for the first time, and Mazzoni, who has been immersed in Serie A for many years, is really not the kind of coach who will make low-level mistakes.
Now, with the retreat of Baggio and Zhang Shu's position, the hidden danger of Brescia's disconnection between the front and back has been eliminated. Whether it is Baggio or Zhang Shu, they both have the ability to connect players in front and back.
It's just that the drawbacks of letting Zhang Shu and Baggio play double forward midfielders are also exposed in this attack.
When the two of them are away from goal, relying only on Toney as a lone striker, does Brescia's attack really not look lackluster?
Capello's composure is justified, and Toney should be the least dangerous of Brescia's front trident, and he is not the striker of Shepchenko George Weah with excellent one-man ability. In Brescia's team, he belongs to the kind of role player who has a rich offensive arsenal, without him, Brescia would have lost the ability to grab the ball and attack space, but if he was alone, he would not be the kind of player who could break through the opponent's door on his own without the two wings to feed him today.
Therefore, many people believe that Brescia should be running to hold on to a draw today.
Samuel stabbed the ball to De Rossi, who retreated, as soon as he broke the ball.
Danielle de Rossi was a native of Rome. His father, De Rossi Sr., is an academy coach at Roma, who joined the Roma academy at the age of 17 and has been playing for Roma since the end of last season. In the hearts of many Roma fans, De Rossi, who has pure Roman blood, will become the new Rome city banner after Totti.
And De Rossi himself is equally proud to be a Roma player, and he dreams of playing for this team for the rest of his life like Giannini and Totti. Born in '83 and just turned 20 in July this year, he would have been the most high-profile talent in the game if it weren't for Zhang.
In the face of a team-mate's poking out of the ball, De Rossi safely stopped the ball at his feet, then turned and prepared to launch a counter-attack.
As a result, as soon as he turned around, he was startled by Zhang Shu who suddenly appeared in front of him, I don't know when, Zhang Shu had already run to his side, he quickly kicked the ball back again, and stuck Zhang Shu behind his back with his body to avoid being robbed. And Zhang Shu didn't force the ball off, just stuck to his back and didn't let him turn around easily.
Zebina had been pulled to the far end of the pitch by Baggio, and it was difficult for De Rossi to make a big leg swing pass to pass the ball under Zhang Shu's harassment. He wanted to pass the ball back to Samoel or Zivu, but found that Tony, who was still in the penalty area just now, had also run back, faintly stuck on the ball path of his return pass, making him a little afraid to pass the ball to the central defender.
It would be dangerous to be cut off by an opponent on the edge of the box.
Eventually, after a few futile feints and finding that he couldn't shake off Zhang Shu and turn around, De Rossi finally found a slightly safer pass and knocked the ball sideways to Lima, who retreated from the wing.
With just such a delay, the rest of Brescia's team has completed the transition between attack and defense, and the fleeting counterattack opportunity of the Roma team no longer exists.
"Tsk, that's a pity." Capello commented lightly off the field.
In his opinion, De Rossi's ball was too muddy, the opportunity just now was actually good, Brescia was cut off when the whole team was still in a loose offensive situation, if the ball could be poured out for the first time, it would be a good counterattack opportunity, but it was delayed by De Rossi's hesitation.
Once the counterattack loses its suddenness, it can only play positional battles with the opponent, and today Brescia has three backs, and it is not easy to break through the opponent's door in the positional battle.
"Young people still need to have more experience, and the overall picture needs to be strengthened." Capello commented to the assistant coach next to him. "In contrast, Zhang is much more mature, although the on-the-spot counter-robbery just now failed to break the football, but in terms of defensive purposes, it has already completed the goal."
"However, it can also be seen from their attack just now that there are still too few offensive means, at least our defensive pressure should not be too great in this game." Roma's assistant coach said. As a member of Capello's coaching team, he is also deeply influenced by Capello's philosophy of emphasizing defense, and he is afraid of defeat before winning.
"Well, that's right, the defense shouldn't be too much of a problem." Capello smiled lightly.
Capello's ease didn't last long, and after just over 10 minutes, his brow furrowed again.
"That's not right! It's not a Christmas tree formation! He muttered under his breath and stepped out of the dugout and stood on the side of the pitch.
After a period of observation, Capello discovered that Brescia's formation was not the 4321 previously identified.
For example, in Brescia's second attack, Zhang Shu did not receive the ball in the middle, but ran to the left, that is, the right side of the Roma team. After attracting the attention of defender Emerson and centre-back Zebina, he passed back to Martinez, who provided the assist, who crossed the ball to the edge of the box and finally slotted home from distance by Di Biagio, who was also inserted.
In this attack, if you don't look at the right side that football does not patronize, Brescia's attack routine this time is clearly a combination of side and center routines in the traditional 442 formation. Two strikers, Toney and Baggio, suppressed Roma's back line in the penalty area, full-back Zhang Shu took the ball to organize the defenders at the front of the Roma penalty area, the full-backs added points to send the ball back to the middle, and finally the midfielders completed the shot outside the large penalty area where the Roma defense was empty.
This abrupt change of attacking thinking caught Roma off guard in the middle, and had it not been for Di Biagio's shot that went just wide of the post, Roma almost conceded a goal early on.
If it was just one time, Capello might have thought it was just a casual pull on a whim. However, in the last few Brescia attacks, Zhang Shu went down from the right side, cut from the left rib, and broke through the ball from the middle, and several attacks caused a huge threat to the Roma defense.
This can't be Zhang Shu's own thoughts, in these attacks, it can be clearly seen that the running positions of Brescia's other players have formed a tacit cooperation with Zhang Shu. To say that this was a flash of inspiration for the players, Capello himself would not believe it.
These complex runs must be routines that can only be used in the fierce Serie A after many practices.
So what exactly is Brescia's formation? What position is Zhang playing today? Capello can't figure it out now.
Not only in attack, but also in defence, Brescia's formation is constantly changing.
Whenever Roma got the ball, they were stalked by Zhang Shu and Toney at the back. This kind of pressing often led to more time for Roma to complete the transition from defence to attack, and with a slight delay, Brescia's former players had already run back into their own half, setting up a back three and four back lines.
The back three keep the edge of the box safe, while one can be used to support their full-backs when they need support on the wings, while the remaining two can still keep Totti under pressure. Not to mention that after a few seconds, even Tony will retreat to a position near the midfield,
Zhang Shu, who never participated in defense last season, will also chase back to the 30-metre area of his own side, and he is not limited to the wings, most of the time Zhang Shu will tend to chase after Roma players with the ball. As long as he is entangled, in addition to Totti, who can rely on his body to forcibly wipe him, even Mancini Jr., who is good at breaking through, has a headache for Zhang Shu's stubborn defense.
In this way, Roma fell into passivity at both offensive and defensive ends. Faced with such a situation, Capello could only frown and keep thinking about countermeasures in his mind, but for a while, he couldn't think of how to crack Brescia's tactics.
He couldn't predict where Brescia's next attack would be, so he couldn't make a targeted defense. Spreading the formation to defend in the zone will weaken Roma's own defensive depth.
Brescia's unwinnable lineup made Capello ponder.
The manager gave no instructions, and the Roma players had to struggle on the pitch according to the tactics arranged before the game.
After a failed attack by Roma, it was time for Brescia to attack.
With the 31st minute of the first half, Roma were already bewildered by Brescia's previous versatility of attack, and they looked like they were on the verge of the next wave of attacks.
Zhang Shu slowly ran to the right side of the field, and the Roma team seemed to be frightened by several quick counterattacks from Brescia, and they retreated quickly, so Zhang Shu was not in a hurry to sprint into the attack area.
Although he underwent brutal physical training during the holidays, the new tactics have high requirements for the players' running, and Zhang Shu, as the core of the team, is the one who runs the most. After 30 minutes of non-stop running, his physical fitness also ushered in the first period of exhaustion earlier than before.
Anyway, the ball was still under Guardiola's control, and Zhang Shu also seized the time to jog to recover his strength.
Next, there's when he's tired.
Soon, he ran to the right of midfield, and seeing that no Roma player had come up to defend him, he raised his hand to Pep Guardiola, signaling that he was ready for the next assault.
The rest of the players had already arrived in their respective areas in accordance with their previous tactical arrangements, with Pep Guardiola still slowing down the ground in central midfield, but the next time the ball flew to his feet, he suddenly picked up the tempo and sent the ball to the right with an out-of-the-ground pass.
With Guardiola's sudden ramp-up, Brescia went into motion like a sophisticated machine.
Zhang Shu stopped Pep Guardiola's pass at his feet and immediately slid the ball towards the Roma half.
Seeing Zhang Shu start to dribble forward, Roma's left wing-back Lima met him, but Zhang Shu directly used an unreasonable pluck to change direction past his defense.
Since knowing that his speed has entered the ranks of fast horses on the side under the effect of skills, Zhang Shu has chosen more and more of this simple and efficient way of passing people in his attack.
Compared with the previous use of rhythm and feints to grind with teammates for a long time, the faster the opponent is passed in the case of speed advantage, which means that the shorter the preparation time left for other defenders, the greater the chance of attacking success.
After breaking through Lima's defense with the ball from the right side, Zhang Shu did not choose to continue to go down, just now he looked up and glanced at the situation on the field, and he had already carefully deduced the offensive route in his heart, Roma's defender De Rossi had already moved to the side, ready to defend himself, he didn't need to waste too much time and entangle with him, that would give Roma a chance to reorganize the defense. So he suddenly turned a corner while dribbling the ball and rushed towards the middle.
Zhang Shu's sudden change of direction made De Rossi, who was already close to the right and waiting for him, useless, and also forced the other remaining Roma midfielder Emerson in the middle to rush over to stop him. Facing the menacing Brazilian, Zhang Shu did not choose to continue to dribble the ball, but passed the ball to Guardiola, who was inserted behind with the inside of his right foot, and continued to move to the left.
Guardiola did not stop the ball after receiving the ball, and directly plugged it in the direction of Zhang Shu's running, after such a two-to-one cooperation, Zhang Shu was already in the upper left corner of the Rome penalty area when he received the ball again. He continued to take a step forward and then picked the ball into the box with the outside of his right foot without warning on the run.
Previously, in order to prevent Zhang Shu from continuing to dribble the ball deeper, Roma left centre-back Zebina took a step to the left, and the ball flew behind him from the gap he left.
Zhang Shu's passing movements were so subtle that he didn't react until the ball flew over his side.
He turned his head in horror to look behind him, and the ball slowly fell from the sky. From his point of view, you can also see goalkeeper Pelizzoli who rushed out in a hurry.
"This ball should be able to be obtained by Pelizoli... Right? In Zebina's heart, there was only such a small wish left at this time.
But a second later, his wish turned into an extravagant wish.
A blue-and-white team uniform figure emerged from the edge of his view, flying parallel to the lawn.
"Leaping header! Tony! ”
In the Sky studio, Fabio shouted the figure's name in a hoarse voice. (To be continued.) )