Chapter 263 The performance of 'Chinese boy'!
The Chinese national football team won this game beautifully, and Zhu Guanghu finally felt relieved.
In an interview with reporters after the game, when the reporter suggested that the Chinese national football team might enter the death group due to the problem of grading, Zhu Guanghu said domineeringly:
"I think we have the confidence to deal with any opponent. The ones who should worry about this problem should not be the Chinese team, but other teams!"
These words were spoken with great confidence, winning applause from many reporters present.
When has Chinese football ever been so tough?
Even the qualification for the World Cup was the result of being drawn into a good group and directly omitting two strong rivals, Japan and South Korea.
But not everyone believed Zhu Guanghu's words. A reporter immediately stood up:
"Hello, Coach Zhu. In the past year, under your leadership, the Chinese national football team has achieved good results in the East Asian Cup, East Asian Games and a series of friendly matches. However, your team has never played against top Asian teams such as Japan, South Korea and Iran in formal occasions. If you really meet them in the group stage of the Asian Cup next year, are you confident that you can beat them?"
Zhu Guanghu smiled and said: "The teams you mentioned are all recognized strong teams in Asia and regular participants in the World Cup. It is a challenge for us to play against them, but there are only quotas for Asia in the World Cup. After Australia joins the AFC, if we cannot beat them head-on on the field, we will not be able to stand out and enter the World Cup in South Africa four years later.
So you ask me if I have confidence, my answer is yes, in order to make it to the World Cup, my team and I will have the courage to move forward and defeat any opponent who stands in our way, no matter if he is strong or weak! ”
This answer won applause from more reporters. This should be the first time that someone at the national team level has publicly expressed their position on the World Cup four years later.
Zhu Guanghu's attitude gave everyone reassurance, and they were also full of expectations for the future of this energetic Chinese team.
……
After the match with Palestine, the Chinese national football team was divided into two again.
The players studying abroad did not choose to return home with the main group, but instead flew directly from Amman, the capital of Jordan, back to Europe.
FIFA match days usually only last for one week. After playing the national team games, they must return to the club as soon as possible, otherwise they may miss the next round of the league.
The next round of Serie A is scheduled for October 10, which is only three days away. The situation of others is similar. They must return to the club as soon as possible to adjust to the jet lag and recover their condition.
Every FIFA Day, there are always some unlucky guys in Inter Milan who get injured in their national team games.
This time it's goalkeeper Cesar's turn to be unlucky!
After the World Cup in Germany, Brazil's veteran goalkeeper Dida announced his retirement from the national team. Cesar, Gomez, Helton, Doni and others were fighting fiercely for the position of Brazil's main goalkeeper.
As a result, because he fought too hard, he collided with the opponent's forward during an attack and suffered symptoms of concussion.
This will cause him to miss 2-4 weeks of games, depending on his recovery.
Cesar's unexpected injury has a great impact on Inter Milan.
Materazzi had just recovered from his injury and was undergoing recovery training, but the main goalkeeper was injured again.
As a last resort, Mancini had to let the old goalkeeper Toldo take over Cesar's position temporarily.
Toldo was once one of Serie A's top goalkeepers, but as he got older, his form began to decline.
After Cesar joined Inter Milan, Toldo quickly lost his main position and his playing time was greatly reduced.
Last season he only played eight times for Inter Milan, and this season is even worse, as he has not played once so far.
For professional athletes, it is difficult to maintain their competitive state if they have no games to play.
Although Toldo has been maintaining a certain intensity in training, training alone cannot replace competition.
In the sixth round of Serie A, Inter Milan played against Catania at home. Toldo made a mistake in the first half, which led to the opponent scoring a goal.
Fortunately, the teammates were strong enough. Torres and Lin Feng scored a goal each in the first and second half, helping Inter Milan complete the reversal and eventually defeat the opponent with a score of 2:1.
Although they won, Toldo's performance as a goalkeeper made many people worried.
Catania is not a strong team, but it can still cause mistakes by Inter Milan's goalkeeper. If Inter Milan encounters a top team at this time, it is likely to suffer a great loss due to the loopholes in the goalkeeper position.
And in two weeks, the Milan derby will be here.
This is a huge test for Inter Milan and their veteran goalkeeper Toldo!
……
Of course, we will have to wait until two weeks later to talk about it. The only thing Mancini is thinking about now is the team’s next opponent!
After the league, the Champions League group stage followed.
Because Serie A started too late this season, the result is that the league has only reached the sixth round, while the Champions League group stage has already reached the third round.
In this round of group matches, Inter Milan will face the challenge of Spartak Moscow at home.
This team is currently the weakest team in Group B and is at the bottom of the points ranking.
So before the game everyone was more optimistic that Inter Milan would win, after all, Inter Milan is currently first in Group B.
But considering that only two rounds of group matches have been played, the current ranking does not mean anything.
Even though Spartak Moscow is at the bottom of the points table, they still have a chance to qualify. Even if they beat Inter Milan in this game, their points will catch up with Inter Milan.
For Inter Milan, facing their opponent at home is both bad news and good news.
The good news is that Moscow is more than 2000 kilometers away from Milan, which is a long-distance journey for European countries, which generally have a small land area.
The team has just finished a national team match and gone through a league game. The players are generally a little tired. At this time, they don’t need to travel long distances to away games, which will give them plenty of time to recover and adjust their condition.
But the bad news is that Moscow in mid-October is not particularly cold, but by November or even December, the temperature will be extremely low.
The average temperature in Moscow in November is around minus three degrees Celsius. If you are unlucky and encounter a cold wave, it is possible that the temperature may drop to minus ten degrees Celsius.
For the Italian team accustomed to the Mediterranean climate, fighting in such a cold place would cause them to lose at least 30% of their combat effectiveness just because of the weather.
In addition, Russian Super League teams generally use artificial turf, which will make players who are accustomed to natural turf even more uncomfortable.
Due to multiple factors, Russian Premier League teams have a very high winning rate at home. Even some top giants find it difficult to gain an advantage when they go to the opponent's home court.
Because of this, beating them at home is particularly important.
Otherwise, if we lose points in both rounds against a team at the bottom of the table, how can we compete with other teams for first place in the group?
...Because in the last game against Bayern, Inter Milan paid a heavy price of two red cards.
So in this game, both Grosso and Stankovic face suspension.
Coupled with the injuries of Materazzi, Cesar and others, Inter Milan's starting lineup is not complete.
But the good news is that Vieira's suspension has finally ended and he returned to the game.
But the bad news is that Crespo was unwell before the game and his starting position was replaced by Cruz.
Since Torres and Crespo joined, Cruz has never started.
Therefore, after learning that he would start in this game, Cruz seemed particularly excited.
Also starting with him is the 'Chinese boy' Recoba. Recoba's situation is different from his. After Martins was abducted by Newcastle, Recoba should have successfully replaced the opponent and become Inter Milan's starting player on the left.
However, his frequent injuries and his fluctuating form made it difficult for Mancini to have high hopes for him. In addition, Mancini's three-midfielder formation compressed the space in the frontcourt, so Recoba was relegated to the bench.
Although the lineup is incomplete, Inter Milan is still in high spirits playing at home.
After the opening, Inter Milan actively launched an attack. Less than 2 minutes into the game, Lin Feng's breakthrough in the frontcourt caused a foul by the opponent. The fouling player was called Mozart.
"Isn't Mozart a musician? Why is he here playing football?"
The fans were also confused when they saw this name. Although they knew it was not the same person, they still found it shocking.
Lin Feng didn't bother with his opponent. He jumped up and prepared to take a free kick.
But the players of Spartak Moscow were very experienced and consciously kicked the ball, not giving him this chance.
Helplessly, Lin Feng had to rearrange the ball, call his teammates over, and prepare to take the free kick seriously.
The position of this free kick was too far to the right, and the angle for a direct shot was not very good, so Lin Feng chose to lift the ball into the penalty area and let his teammates compete for the header.
But who knew that when he took a free kick from the right, Vieira struggled to squeeze out from the crowd of opposing defenders, stretched out his long legs, and passed the ball to Cruz.
When Cruz saw that Lin Feng did not pass the ball to him, he was ready to give up the attack, but he did not expect Vieira to send the ball to him in this way.
Although this ball was beyond his expectations, Cruz reacted extremely quickly.
The moment he received the ball, he swung his left leg almost as a conditioned reflex, and volleyed the ball with his left foot from 9 meters in front of the goal, sending the ball into the top of the goal!
1 is better than 0!
Just three minutes into the game, Inter Milan took the lead!
The goal came too quickly and too suddenly, leaving many Inter fans at the scene unable to react.
Many people had just entered the stadium and were still busy finding their seats. Some people had just sat down and had no time to look at the stadium when they suddenly felt the stadium shaking and everyone was cheering and celebrating.
Bewildered, they subconsciously glanced at the scoreboard and were stunned: We are leading already?
Ahhh, I haven't seen it yet!
Although they didn't see it, once they realized what was happening, they joined the celebration!
Never mind, it’s our goal, let’s celebrate first!
Cruz's goal boosted Inter Milan's morale. One minute later, Recoba made a cross into the penalty area from the left, but the opponent's defender was very focused this time and cleared the ball out of the baseline in advance.
Inter Milan’s corner kick, Lin Feng still chose to lift the ball into the penalty area.
Vieira jumped high to get the ball, but his header was too far off and posed no threat to the goal.
In the 5th minute, Spartak Moscow finally launched a decent attack.
Dacourt brought down the opponent's No. 10 player Pavlyuchenko in his own half, and Spartak won a free kick on the right.
Mozart, who took the free kick, chose to shoot himself. He hit a beautiful arc ball with his left foot, but unfortunately he failed to control the angle and the ball went over the crossbar.
A few minutes later, it was Mozart again. After receiving the pass from his teammate, he did not choose to pass it to the forward, but instead took a long shot from 20 meters in front of the goal.
There was no anti-aircraft gun in this shot, but the shot was too straight and was easily resolved by Toldo.
Although Toldo did make a mistake in the last game, it is still too difficult to make him make a mistake with a shot of this level.
The opponent's offensive round did not last long, and Inter Milan quickly regained the upper hand through active counter-attacks in the midfield.
In the 8th minute, Maicon dribbled the ball at high speed and then made a cross from the right. Cruz was a little slow in his interception in front of the goal and the ball slipped past the goal.
Maicon made a very good pass for this ball, but unfortunately there was no tacit understanding between him and his teammates. Cruz thought he was going to pass a high ball and was ready to compete for the header.
But Maicon threw a ground ball, which slowed Cruz down a bit.
But it doesn’t matter, if you fail once, you can try again.
Two minutes later, it's Maicon again!
The opponent's defender couldn't stop him at all and could only watch him move freely on the wing.
This time, Maicon did not pass the ball in a hurry, but observed for a while. Seeing that the opponent's full-back was standing back, Maicon did not choose to pass the ball, but boldly dribbled the ball into the penalty area.
This choice was beyond the opponent's expectations and immediately attracted a double-team from the full-back and center back.
The two men cut off Maicon's passing line, and now he can only pass the ball back or force a kick himself.
In fact, when Mccon made this decision, Lin Feng had already taken the initiative to respond, but Mccon had no eyes behind him and did not see Lin Feng's actions.
Unwilling to give up this offensive opportunity, he volleyed the ball from a small angle on the right.
Although the angle of this shot was relatively small, the quality of Maicon's shot was quite high, posing a great challenge to Spartak Moscow goalkeeper Kovalevskiy!
After two consecutive failed attacks from the flanks, Inter Milan shifted its offensive focus to the middle.
In the 11th minute of the first half, Lin Feng made a lob pass with his right foot at the top of the penalty area. Recoba used his chest to cushion the ball before the goalkeeper could rush out. Like a dancing dancer, he stopped the ball on the left side, turned around and kicked the ball with his left foot while facing the goal sideways. The ball passed over the fingertips of goalkeeper Kowalewski, and Cruz, who was unguarded at the back post, headed the ball into the goal from 4 meters in front of the goal!
The score became 2 to 0!
This goal stunned all the fans at the scene. Cruz's goal was not difficult, but Recoba's handling of it was simply an art!
(End of this chapter)
