Football games, for the players on the field, are a battle of wits and courage, and for the coaches on the sidelines, it is a deception.

Barcelona's strength and tacit understanding can allow Guardiola to respond to all changes with invariance, but Manchester City can't, even if it is a home game, Linsen still needs to move a little "crooked brain" similar to Tian Ji horse racing.

When discussing the tactical strategy of this game with the coaching staff, Lin Sen came to three conclusions that may be considered nonsense by many.

In fact, there are three terms: Messi, Xavi, and midfielder.

Watch out for Messi, it's something that all teams that don't want to lose too ugly against Barcelona know. Watch out for Xavi, it's all you need to know if you don't want to lose to Barcelona. And being careful in midfield is something that all teams trying to beat Barcelona need to remember.

Barcelona's strongest is the midfielder.

Even if Messi is classified as a striker, the Barcelona midfielder with Xavi, Iniesta and others is still the strongest link in Barcelona's third line, not only because of the names of these people, but also because the foundation of the Barcelona team was originally in the midfield. Therefore, the midfield will be the key to the victory or defeat of Manchester City's game.

For this point, there are also differences among the coaching staff, Tang Hua believes that it is possible to directly bypass Barcelona's midfield and play English long passes. The so-called long pass rushing and hanging, in fact, can be understood literally, "long pass" refers to long-distance passing, "rushing" refers to high-speed walking, "hanging" is a high-altitude header, this tactic that has declined in the mainstream league is actually still popular in the lower leagues, because this tactic goal process is more direct, less use of personal skills to organize the offensive and score goals, to put it bluntly, it is a tactic to fight the body.

Therefore, the simple and direct long pass rush hanging, for the current Manchester City, can theoretically be the most "short avoidance". But this proposal was ultimately rejected by Lin Sen, because although it "avoids shortcomings", it cannot "promote strengths". There are two basic hardware requirements for long passing: a player with excellent long passing skills and a tall striker, both of which are indispensable. And these two points, the former Manchester City is okay, and the latter is very reluctant.

The former, who is currently the best in the Manchester City team, apart from Yaya Toure, is actually a rather unexpected name, Javi Martinez.

This season Javi Martinez has come a long way from last season, where his substitute is now in the middle of the back four. has come to the second place, what impressed Linsen at the beginning and made Linsen directly activate the termination clause to poach him from Bilbao to Manchester City was Martinez's defensive ability, but now, what made him squeeze into the starting lineup was his offensive progress, and this improvement, the most important thing is the improvement of scheduling ability. Thanks to the Spanish national team, or simply thanks to Barcelona, the back of Spain. More or less comes with a little organizational talent, and the natural skill is the long pass.

As for the latter, Suarez, Adriano and Falcao, this is City's current forward configuration. Suarez can be the first to rule out, Adriano is physically fit, but unfortunately headers are not his strong point, Falcao is good at it. It's a pity that his physical condition can't take much advantage of the other party, Pique and Mascherano and others.

It was Kidd who disagreed with Tang Hua. He believes that this game must not allow Barcelona's midfield to run smoothly.

Lin Sen was on Kidd's side this time. Against Barcelona, their midfield is absolutely unavoidable, so they can only touch hard. Of course, this is not an egg hitting a stone, because since you know that the other party is holding a stone, if you still touch it with an egg, it is purely your own death, so you need to change the way.

Lin Sen's way is to put four sweepers in the midfield, two majors and two minors.

Two wings Bale plus Arjen Robben.

"No Striker?"

Lin Sen knew that his chance could only be at home, and Guardiola knew what the other party wanted to do, so he and Vilanova imagined no less than five scenarios to speculate what "strange move" Lin Sen would make in this game, but Lin Sen still surprised them after all.

No striker, to put it bluntly, there is no striker formation, Linson put on a formation similar to a Christmas tree, but there is no striker, Xavi Martinez, De Jong, Vidal three back midfielders lined up, Yaya Toure, who is also a back midfielder, stood directly in the position of the front midfield, and on both sides of him, Robben and Bale.

With such a formation, some sacrifices must have been made in attack, but the midfield has been strengthened like never before.

"It's really surprising that Lin ruled out a formation that no one expected." ESPN's commentators made no secret of their surprise.

"This formation is similar...... the commentator sitting next to him had a different look on his face, "Remember the Spanish national derby a while ago?" It's the one that drew 1-1. ”

"That's what you say." Being reminded like this, the narrator thought for a moment and suddenly came back to his senses.

The most recent national derby was on April 17, that is, more than a week ago, Mourinho, who played Barcelona for the second time this season, changed his most familiar 4231 position to 433, and the most significant change in midfield was to bring Pepe, who has excellent tackling ability, to the midfield.

In that game, Real Madrid, which was almost blown up by Barcelona in the first leg, played 1-1 with the opponent, ending a five-game losing streak against Barcelona, of course, the greater significance of this draw is to re-establish Real Madrid's confidence and establish Real Madrid's confidence in Mourinho.

Lin Sen's current formation is difficult not to be reminiscent of Real Madrid at that time.

At this time, Mourinho, who was sitting at home in Madrid watching the game, showed a smile and a hint of helplessness on the corner of his mouth when he saw Manchester City's start.

Is this plagiarism?

Not all, because Lin Sen was clearly more thorough than him, and even the only striker was removed by him.

So, this is a reference?

For reference, this is really a scoundrel word, you know, Mourinho got that formation, he paid the tuition, and it was a very high tuition.

Guardiola frowned, needless to say, such a starter made him feel someone's shadow.

The game began with a round of applause and then a chorus of singing.

The long-lasting singing in the stands has always been a feature of the Premier League, and unlike other leagues that like to use banners or slogans to express their support for the team, singing is the most common form of support for English fans, and singing to the end is also the basic essence of die-hard fans, in this regard, other leagues in Europe are incomparable to the Premier League.

It seemed that in response to the singing of the fans, Manchester City entered the rhythm of the game from the very beginning of the game.

The main battlefield, without any suspense, appeared in the midfield.

And Pep Guardiola's expression quickly became grim, because the three midfielders composed of Xavi, Busquets and Keita, except for Xavi who could occasionally pass some balls, the other two were quickly lost in Manchester City's back group.

Barcelona's three-midfield system, Xavi is biased, Butskec is defensive, and Keita is in between, of course, the responsibilities are not fixed, because Barcelona's midfielder, in fact, has only one work in the attack, that is, passing, continuous passing penetration. Therefore, Barcelona's passing line is very particular, and the most often seen scene is the triangle pass.

Such a pass is almost invincible with the cooperation of several stars in the front field, however, now, Manchester City has blocked such a passing line in a simple and crude way: relying on the number of people in the midfield.

In fact, such a move Guardiola has not been encountered, and even more people have not been seen, many weak teams when they meet Barcelona, it is not uncommon to see a formation like 541, and their forwards often retreat, it is not surprising to say that it is 550, but the trouble they caused to Barcelona is far less effective than the current Manchester City.

Seeing Xavi's pass cut off by Yaya Toure again, Guardiola began to bite his fingers.

This is not the first time, and obviously not the last.

Javi Martinez, Spain's new international, Frenkie de Jong, Dutch main midfielder, Vidal, Chile's main midfielder, Yaya Toure, Ivory Coast midfield...... Such a midfielder composed of four people, once defended wholeheartedly, it is simply a flesh and blood grinding disc, with almost no weaknesses, whether it is height or speed, defensive depth or width, and even, in order to make this grinding disc more powerful, Lin Sen also made an article on the specifications of the court.

Of course, the most troublesome is Yaya Toure, the Ivorian who was just let go by himself last summer, and now Guardiola feels a little blind, he knows Yaya Toure's defensive talent, but he didn't expect the opponent's offensive talent to be so good, and now, the opponent is using his familiarity with the Barcelona system to become the most troublesome storage in Barcelona's midfield.

The game had been going on for almost half an hour, with both teams having only a handful of shots on goal, and in the words of the commentator, both teams had put too much effort into the entanglement of the midfield.

At this point, Guardiola lowered his hand and put both hands in his pocket, as if he had stopped thinking.

Did he figure out how to cope?

No, he just figured it out a little.

Manchester City "disrupted" Barcelona's attacking rhythm in this way, but why didn't it "disrupt" their own attacking rhythm?

Last time, Mourinho did not hesitate to do this because they have an all-powerful Cristiano Ronaldo up front who can solve the problem. And now, Linsen, who has done more thoroughly than Mourinho, what does he want to rely on to solve the problem?

At the end of the day, this is Manchester City's home stadium, and if they don't attack, then the best they can get is to go to Camp Nou with a draw.

That's a big stadium!

"You won't forget, you're the one who should be attacking, right?!"

Pep Guardiola said something in his heart.

It's just that his eyes didn't look at Lin Sen who was standing not far from him. (To be continued......)

PS: I wish you all a happy Lantern Festival! Although, as always, late.