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Just two minutes into the second half, Valencia's players followed Cooper's instructions and launched an attack.

After playing a neat one-two with Farinos in the middle and breaking through Effenberg's interception, Gerard quickly passed the ball to Mendieta, who was pulled down the right flank.

As the core of Valencia's on-field and captain, Mendieta was at the peak of his career at this time, attacking and defending, and quite a general. At the same time, Valencia's tactical system gives Mendieta a high degree of tactical freedom, allowing him to move around the middle and right of the pitch as he pleases, and organise his team from any position he deems appropriate.

I have to say that being able to give Mendieta such a lot of tactical freedom, Cooper, the Valencia coach, still has some courage, and this is an important reason for the Spanish midfielder's strong rise this season!

Against Roberto Carlos, Mendieta did not attempt to challenge the Brazilian left-sided defence. Compared to his contemporaries such as Raul and Guti, Mendieta's technique at his feet is actually a bit rough, and his strengths lie in his wide range of movements, concentration and excellent big-picture vision, as well as a good long-range shot. Therefore, it would be unwise for Mendieta to rush to fight Carlos.

And that's probably why Mendieta began to decline so quickly after leaving Valencia - a player who needs a lot of trust and tactical freedom to show his true value, without which Mendieta would be a good midfielder at best, and he wouldn't have sold for $48 million.

A player like Mendieta, he can be very versatile, but he can't really be used as an all-around fighter like Nedved. Otherwise, the fate of Zhuang Mingge's Lazio team in his previous life is the best example.

The same is true for stars like Frank Lampard, Wayne Rooney and Raul, who all have strengths and weaknesses, and if they want to play their value, they have to find ways to make them play to their strengths and avoid their weaknesses, rather than making them do inappropriate work and require them to play world-class in this area - if someone puts Pele and Maradona at the back, then international football will only have two less powerful football kings and two more ordinary defenders who do nothing.

Therefore, after receiving Gerrard's pass, Mendieta just made a breakthrough feint to shake Carlos, and then directly kicked a cross across most of the stadium and passed the ball to Claudio López, who was ambushed at the back of the Fiorentina penalty area!

Although the Argentine worm's height of 1.78 meters limited his header ability in a large way, López made up for it with his excellent technique, only to see the Argentine deftly unload Mendieta's cross with his left foot, and then shoot directly under the defense of Stam!

Toldo's attention was very concentrated, he had been waiting in front of the goal, he held the ball shot by Lopez firmly in his arms, and at the same time did not forget to look at Lopez provocatively, the meaning was quite obvious: Such a simple shot wants to break my ten fingers, are you daydreaming?

After saving López's shot, Toldo quickly kicked the ball towards the middle circle of the pitch without waiting for the Valencia player to return, he was very confident in his footwork, and he was confident that his teammates in front of him would be able to receive his pass!

Vieri lived up to Toldo's trust, leaning on Pellegrino and ferrying the ball to Shevchenko, who was inserted from the other side, but the latter did not take advantage of the opportunity, and the Ukrainian's shot was blocked by the decisive Canizares, leaving only the mournful voices of the Fiorentina fans in the stands and a sigh of Shevchenko in the box with his head in his hands.

Seeing that Fiorentina's counterattack was once again defused by its own goalkeeper, the Valencia fans in the stands couldn't help cheering, and the Valencia players on the pitch also let go of their fears and refocused their attention on the attack. Obviously, after witnessing Canizares' wonderful performance, the Valencia players believe that Fiorentina's counterattack will not pose much of a threat to them, and even if they are beaten into a counterattack by their opponents, they are sure that they will be in place!

If Fiorentina's counterattack still failed to arouse the attention and vigilance of Valencia players, then next, Fiorentina used bloody facts to tell this Champions League newcomer and biggest dark horse a truth, that is, in the Champions Cup, if you don't maintain enough vigilance at all times, you will die a miserable death......

In the 51st minute, Mendieta's cross from the right was cleared out of the penalty area by Stam first, and Redondo, who received the ball from Makelele, made a long pass to Shevchenko, who was pulled to the left!

The Ukrainian didn't give Angloma a chance to interfere or commit a direct tactical foul this time, and he started at full speed to leave the latter far behind, and then rushed into the Valencia penalty area from the corner of the box with the ball!

Seeing that Shevchenko had advanced to such a dangerous position, Djukic, who had rushed back to the penalty area with all his might, didn't care if there were still outflanked Fiorentina players behind him, and pounced directly on the Ukrainians! The Yugoslav veteran intends to rely on his years of experience on the battlefield to disrupt Fiorentina's counter-attack with a clean tackle!

Although he is likely to be cheated by Shevchenko of a penalty if he does so, Djukic believes that as long as his tackle is clean enough, no matter how strict the referee is, he will not award Fiorentina a penalty lightly in such a heavy situation as the Champions League final!

However, at this very moment, Canizares, who had played so well in the previous time, made a mistake - when Djukic had already stepped forward to defend Shevchenko, the Spanish international chose to take the initiative instead of staying in front of the goal to guard against the Ukrainians to flank his teammates in the middle!

Shevchenko is not a lone wolf like Romario, he really can't learn the style of shooting and not passing the ball anyway, and after a season at Fiorentina, he has become more aware of the importance of cooperation. So, noticing the movement of Canizares and Djukic, he picked up his left foot and passed the ball out of the gap between the two!

"Well done!" Vieri, who followed up in the middle, naturally did not let go of this golden opportunity to score, and the Italian center forward fired a clean and furious shot into the empty goal in front of him!

1 to 0! Valencia has finally paid dearly for their negligence!