Chapter 1105: Still Strong
The 2013-2014 Champions League group draw saw the world's No. 1 Super Group of Death, leading many in the industry to conclude that Valencia, who dominated La Liga and Europe for the previous three seasons, are likely to lose their place this season.
Because if Valencia wants to stand out in the Super Death group, they have to put in 100% concentration.
But investing more focus in the Champions League group stage means a distraction in the league, and La Liga is now a big departure from the three-way battle of the past, with Diego Simeone's Atletico Madrid showing the fangs they deserve.
Atletico Madrid may not be able to make a strong impact on the league title, but it will certainly disrupt the original pattern of the league and lead to more chaos in La Liga in the new season.
Once this happens, the mentality of Valencia's players will change, and they will begin to doubt whether they can continue to dominate La Liga and Europe, and when the time comes, they will be more distracted by the two-front or even three-line battle, which will lead to the loss of a certain crown.
Even Valencia manager Carlo Ancelotti is hesitant to ignore the domestic league and cup competitions at that time, because the Champions League will always be number one in the minds of the big clubs.
Before that, though, Valencia has one more UEFA Super Cup fixture.
That is, the day after the draw for the 2013-2014 Champions League group, Carlo Ancelotti, Iello and Wang Xiaolei took a flight to Prague, Czech Republic, where they will play a UEFA Super Cup match against Chelsea, the winner of the Europa League in the 2012-2013 season, at Eden Stadium at 8:45 pm on the 31st.
It is worth mentioning that this year's European Champions League was the first time since 1998 that the UEFA Super Cup was not played at the Stade Louis II in Monaco.
In addition, this game was the second meeting between former Real Madrid manager Jose Mourinho and Valencia after returning to Chelsea.
As we all know, Mourinho left Real Madrid because of a shamstring with Casillas and Cristiano Ronaldo, the bosses of the club's dressing room.
But the actual reason is that Valencia's performance is too strong, whether it is Barcelona who are in full swing or Real Madrid, who have been transformed into a super counter-attacking ability by Mourinho, there is no way to compete with them.
So the reason why Mourinho left Real Madrid is to blame Valencia, and Valencia's performance so strong is inseparable from the super performance of their captain Ailo.
Therefore, some media with ulterior motives claimed that it was Ailo who caused Mourinho to be sacked at Real Madrid in an attempt to sow discord.
As a result, while questioning the fairness of the UEFA draw, there was a lot of media attention on the UEFA Super Cup at Eden Stadium.
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There is no doubt that the key figures in this game are returning Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho and former Chelsea player Elo, now Valencia captain.
Iello is a special presence for Chelsea fans, and his arrival has helped Chelsea go from being a top team to a top team, and he has made new history by winning various competitions in 2007-2008 and 2008-2009.
For such a player who has made a huge contribution, they really have no reason to boo, but it is even more inappropriate to cheer for a period of time in the game, so ......
However, after the start of the game, Chelsea fans will not be entangled, because Valencia is still so strong, Mourinho, who has returned to Chelsea, has just taken charge of this team, plus many core players have just been bought, and it will take a certain amount of time to run in, and the initiative of the game is completely at the feet of Valencia.
It is still a familiar feeling, Mourinho is very speechless, but there is also no choice, in the face of such a super controlling Valencia, he can only choose passive defense and love to put the bus in front of the goal.
As the saying goes, Chelsea's dispatch is to put a bus in front of the goal, but in fact it is not really a bus in front of the goal.
Chelsea's all-time superhero Iroh opened the scoring for Valencia in the second half of the game when he found the back of the net from a direct free-kick and then doubled the lead for substitute Isco to take advantage of Chelsea's desire for a quick equaliser.
And this score was also the final score, Valencia beat Chelsea 2-0 and became the king of European kings again.
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In fact, no one was surprised that Valencia beat Chelsea, after all, Valencia's overall strength is there, with Iello they are like a nuclear deterrent, making Chelsea unguardable, plus this Chelsea is a rebuilding Chelsea, it will take a certain amount of time to run in, so the result of the game has become logical.
Winning the UEFA Super Cup did not make Carlo Ancelotti happy, as the result of the Champions League group draw was a big headache for him, and Paris Saint-Germain, Borussia Dortmund and Napoli in the same group were not good at all.
Each team has the quality to become the league champion in their respective leagues, especially Paris Saint-Germain, who have a lot of money to buy the players they want in the transfer market.
In addition, the first half of the season in the Spanish national derby is just after the crucial UEFA Champions League group stage, if there is a significant gap in the strength of the same group of teams can also be appropriate distraction, but any opponent drawn in the same group is not to be underestimated, if you want to win, you must put in 100% combat power.
This, coupled with some bold speculation from some football insiders, has made Ancelotti more and more worried.
Because Valencia has been so successful over the years, Carlo Ancelotti fears that a dip in performance this season will cause a lot of media bombardment.
However...... As time passed, Ancelotti found that his worries were unnecessary.
The performance of captain Iroh is still amazing, coupled with the effective motivation of young players for the middle generation players, and the atmosphere in the team is extremely good, so Valencia directly came to a wave of ten consecutive wins in the league, accumulating 30 points, ranking first in the league, four points ahead of second Barcelona .
The Champions League group stage, which was considered to be a very bumpy road to qualification, played four consecutive wins, qualified early, and even won the group ahead of schedule.
This result is very unexpected, and the strong Valencia has also made the three major European bookmakers have to adjust the odds, and the odds of Valencia winning the championship in all seasons have been readjusted back to become the first.