Chapter 8: Unstoppable
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Although the long flight of 10,000 miles made Gao Jun very tired, he did not have much time to rest after returning to Milan, because on November 22, Inter Milan will welcome another Serie A title opponent - the "old lady" Juventus team. Although Juventus was once hurt by the relegation penalty because of the "phonegate" incident, they actively recruited after returning to the first division, and now their strength has recovered to more than eighty percent of their peak, coupled with their steady and conservative style of play, even the current momentum of the Inter Milan team, it is not easy to take all three points on this opponent, even if Inter Milan has the advantage of home in this game, at least the vast majority of Italian media think so.
And after the start of the game, the Juventus team, which has always been solid in defense, quickly showed their characteristics, and the strategy of always having more than two people to cover the defense of the high army greatly interfered with the tandem organization of Inter Milan's front, could it be that Inter Milan's 11-game winning streak in Serie A will end here?
"It's Juventus, the defense is really airtight!" After Mourinho sighed lightly, the corners of his mouth sneered again, "But you can't win the game by defense alone, Juventus's attack power is already a little insufficient, and with so many people concentrated on Gao Jun, how much strength do they still have to attack?" â
"What's more, both of our strikers have strong one-on-one ability, do you think that the two of them have lost their ability to break through individually because our team has relied on teamwork to score goals in these games?" , Mourinho had a certain plan in his heart, and immediately made adjustments to the offensive strategy on the field. Since then, Inter Milan's forward ball in the back field is no longer always looking for Gao Jun as before, but more choose to directly long pass to find Adriano in front of the high point, and his header is ferried to his teammates, or directly stop and attack by himself, because this game is Inter Milan's home stadium, with the help of the home whistle, Adriano's power advantage is fully played. There are already two or three defenders who have been sent to target the high army, and the Juventus team must evacuate almost all the defensive forces if they want to defend against Ade, unless they are thick enough to put on a shameless 901 or 802 formation like a relegation team, but Juventus is also a European giant, and it has not been completely convinced by Inter Milan, so it still can't do this kind of trick after all
Considering Adriano's individual ability but poor fitness, the Juventus manager finally chose to take the risk, as long as he can hold on until Adriano runs out of energy without conceding a goal, then the situation of this game will turn in the direction of Juventus. But what he didn't expect was. Samuel Eto'o, who seems to have been in a dip in form in recent games, was the key man in the game, and in the 28th minute, he broke the deadlock for Inter Milan when he was unmarked on the back of a cross from full-back Zivo to help Inter Milan break the deadlock on the pitch, and the game was completely on the defensive track that Mourinho does best
Although Juventus lived up to the name of "Old Woman" and endured until the threat of the fall of the Adanti lĂŹ was no longer the threat before starting to strengthen the attack, as soon as the opponent began to press, the high army would be resurrected. Just three minutes into the second half, he was on a quick counter-attack with a cross from partner Samuel Eto'o and into the net. Helped Inter Milan extend the score to 2:0
It must be noted here that although Mourinho was very dissatisfied with Stankovic's failure to pass the ball, Inter Milan's current midfield still lacks good attacking players after all, so in recent games, Mourinho has restarted to give Stankovic the opportunity to play, mainly as Adriano's substitute. In this way, Gao Jun will return to the front line and resume his duties as a killer. In other words, Mourinho no longer asks Gao Jun to do blue-collar jobs like defensive strikers, because Gao Jun has fully proven his extraordinary talent in attack, and it is a waste for him to spend too much body and spirit on defense
And Stankovic now also knows that Gao Jun's shooting ability is far from being comparable to himself, and the experience of sitting on the bench for many consecutive games has also made him a lot more honest. So now he won't be as wasted as he was before. However, this is also because Mourinho has withdrawn him to the position of central midfielder, and there are obviously not as many good long-range shooting opportunities as before, so he can only pass the ball to his teammates honestly. On the other hand, an appropriate retreat is also conducive to giving full play to Stankovic's not weak defensive ability, which can be regarded as a clever move, but even Mourinho, the world's top football coach, found the team's best lineup after more than ten games, which shows that football is far from being as simple as those domestic "post bar coaching staff" think
The icing on the cake pushed Juventus into a desperate push, but in doing so, they made their already porous backline even weaker. In the 61st minute, Inter Milan played a quick counterattack after the midfielder broke the ball, and right-back McCone sent a high-quality 45-degree diagonal pass, outflanking the follow-up Gao Jun and Eto'o, the two fast horses, and finally Eto'o, who was brave in this game, scored another city, further expanding the score on the field to 3:0!
This goal completely destroyed Juventus' determination to win, and the "old woman" is the "old woman", in this case, they did not attack for the sake of face, but chose to retreat in the rest of the game to avoid being completely demoralized by Inter Milan's goal. Although this conservative approach angered many Juventus fans in the stands, it allowed their backline to regain stability, and Inter Milan slowed down the pace of attack when they saw that it was good, and finally maintained the score of 3:0 until the end, Inter Milan completed an incredible 12 consecutive wins in Serie A this season, and if you count the Champions League matches in between, it is even more terrifying
In front of Inter Milan's unstoppable appearance, even many Italian media who have been opposing Mourinho have changed their attitude, after all, the football world is always the winner is king, and Inter Milan fans have not yet been arrogant to the level of Real Madrid fans, who can be invincible on all fronts, such a table has far exceeded their expectations, and Inter Milan's astonishing number of goals of more than 3 goals per game has also made those media reporters accuse Mourinho of tactical conservative words into a big joke
After the 3-0 win over Juventus, Inter Milan were already considered the strongest team in Serie A, but it also had a less favourable effect, and that was that every Serie A team that played against Inter Milan since then has taken on a counter-attacking posture, even those of the strongest Serie A teams. This is actually a big challenge for Mourinho, who is not very good at playing with the ball. But now there is a Gao Jun who is extremely good at seizing opportunities in the Inter Milan team, and the mentality of his teammates has become more calm because of his storage, so the ability to seize opportunities has also been significantly enhanced, so that Inter Milan's offensive efficiency is terrifying, especially Gao Jun's shooting scoring rate is more than 50%, although it has declined compared to when he was in the Bundesliga, but considering the world's first defense in Serie A, Gao Jun's shooting can still only be described as BT. With the overall strength of Inter Milan far stronger than the original Dresden Dynamo team, even if Mourinho is not very good at controlling the ball and attacking positionally, he can create a considerable number of scoring opportunities in each game, so a terrible team that is almost completely inexplicable in Serie A is born
In a sense, it is Mourinho's caution that has made this "big country" far stronger than in history, and for the remaining two Champions League group games that are no longer meaningful, Mourinho did not hesitate to carry out a large rotation of players to avoid the chance of injury to the main players. Even a draw and a defeat were enough to ensure Inter Milan overtook Greece's Panathinaikos to top the group. Perhaps the only thing that has been lost because of this is that Gao Jun has not played in these two games, which has affected his goal tally in this season's Champions League, right? But Gao Jun obviously doesn't care about this, and he doesn't need to score goals in meaningless games
In Serie A, Mourinho did his best in every game, and as a result, in the following six consecutive Serie A games, even if every opponent was holding back, Inter Milan still won all of them, and the record of consecutive wins in the history of Serie A and even the entire Serie A league has been refreshed to an incredible eighteen games. So much so that many Italian media couldn't help but ask: "Who else can stop Inter Milan?" Some even believe that Inter Milan have now locked up the eventual title, even though Serie A is only halfway through the tournament
It is also worth mentioning that although Gao Jun missed two of these games for some reason, he still scored five goals and had three assists, becoming the biggest contributor to the team's winning streak. But regrettably, in the 2008 European Ballon d'Or competition announced on December 2, 2008, Gao Jun still lost to Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo by 3 votes
Objectively speaking, Cristiano Ronaldo's performance last season was indeed almost perfect, he scored a total of 42 goals throughout the season, surpassing the legendary George of Manchester United's history. Best set a record that year, and more importantly, he also helped the team win the Premier League, UEFA Champions League and Club World Cup. In comparison, although Gao Jun's personal number is more amazing, but the team's honor is a step worse, the gold content of the League Cup is far less than the Champions League, the Bundesliga is not as good as the Premier League, and the German Cup and the Olympic champions have little weight in world football, so it is understandable that he lost in the competition for the European Ballon d'Or, but there are also many people who believe that Gao Jun is a Chinese, which is the main reason for his failure in this competition (to be continued......