Chapter 452: Chapter 451: The Three Great Sages, Each with Their Own Strengths
"GOAL! Two-nil! Vieira nearly blasted the goal of Sporting Lisbon wide open!"
"Sporting Lisbon is in big trouble! These two goals conceded are not typical of a team at their level!"
"Vidic and Guardiola successively made clearance errors, they performed like two primary school students!"
"In fact, such situations had already occurred in the previous Portuguese league games!"
"The players of Sporting Lisbon have been quite unstable in their recent games. The running distance of the players has obviously decreased, and there is also a problem with the aggressiveness of their tackles on the field."
"They’ve entered the Exhaustion Period. It’s Guardiola’s first time playing without a winter break, and he’s having a lot of trouble adapting. Keep in mind, he’s already thirty years old; he’s not young anymore."
Guardiola had black lines all over his head.
Damn it!
This mistake was indeed caused by an internal issue.
During the defense run back, Guardiola failed to constantly turn his head to observe.
This is subconscious, midfield players all have good habits of observation.
But subconscious actions, when you lack physical fitness, tend to decrease unconsciously, and you hardly notice it yourself.
For this, Guardiola felt the team shouldn’t blame him.
After all, he had had so many injuries during his last few years at Barça.
Having maintained a high standard for half a season with Sporting Lisbon, what else do you want, a bicycle?
Deng Kai felt that Guardiola’s reasoning was sound, so he signaled for Guardiola to switch positions with Yaya Toure.
Then he communicated with his teammates to focus on attacking from the right for the time being, first letting Ronaldo try to see if he could use his technique to create a breakthrough.
If Ronaldo couldn’t make it work, then it was time to release the hounds.
Ronaldo: ???
Kaka: ???
Tactics, release-the-hounds frisbee tactics—don’t be so sensitive, you speed dogs.
"Ronaldo, try not to speed up unless you’ve completely made him lose his balance," Deng Kai imparted the secret of playing against Cole to Ronaldo.
Although Ashley Cole is only twenty-two this year, he had already become Arsenal’s first-choice left-back last season.
This season, his performance has been even more outstanding, and he has become an absolute regular for the team.
If nothing unexpected happens, he would be able to represent the team in forty games this season.
Cole’s speed is extremely fast, and his running ability is strong; the English-style defense ensures his tackling ability is also excellent.
His strength lies in his resilience, not easily broken.
But the limitation is due to the playing style of the team, lacking the ability to turn the tide of the game, unable to play the role of the key man.
Ronaldo has impressive explosive power, but when it comes to speed compared to Cole, there’s still a gap, as just saw.
But if Ronaldo can suppress Cole’s speed, then Cole will be in trouble.
True to form, in the next few minutes, Ronaldo put on a personal dribbling show.
Cole was immediately put on the defensive.
Any time he made a casual move, Ronaldo could get past him.
But if he didn’t move, Ronaldo could try to organize and pass some threatening balls.
Thankfully, Vieira’s coverage was big enough to help defend Cole, otherwise Arsenal’s left side would have really been in danger.
The twenty-ninth minute.
After drawing Vieira in, Ronaldo played a lobbed pass back to Deng Kai.
Deng Kai hit the ball with a volley-pass, sending it to the left side.
"Deng Kai’s signature technique has appeared, ultra-fast passing!"
"Sporting Lisbon almost completed the offense side switch from right to left in half a second. Arsenal’s defense on this side is clearly lacking, putting their ability to shift defense to the test."
"Arsenal’s other defensive midfielder, Parlour, obviously did not expect Deng Kai’s switch to be so fast and was completely outplayed by that pass."
"Kaka is speeding up! He’s involved in a fierce twenty-meter sprint with Arsenal’s right-back Lauren."
"Both of Arsenal’s fullbacks have very fast speeds, which is one of the foundations of their beautiful offense. But Kaka’s speed seems to be in no way inferior to Lauren’s!"
"Lauren eventually opted for a conservative approach, allowing Kaka to take possession."
"Kaka receives the ball and passes it sideways... Ronaldo wall-pass! He’s past him; with Ronaldo’s help, Kaka has used a one-two combination to leave Lauren completely behind!"
"Ronaldo dashes toward the penalty area, raising his hand to ask for the ball back, ah spit... raising his hand asking for the ball."
"Kaka slows down, makes a slight adjustment, and kicks the cross!"
"Ronaldo leaps up at the near post... miles away from the football!"
"Ibrahimovic! The Swedish tower takes off! He has muscled out Keown and secured the position!"
"GOAL! The ball is in!"
"What a smooth transition attack, beautiful flank crossing!"
"Zlatan... Ibrahimovic!"
The Estádio Alvalade instantly became a sea of joy.
The fans kept chanting:
"Zlatan!"
"Zlatan!"
"Zlatan!"
And Ibrahimovic undoubtedly turned his head to look at Wenger.
As if asking the other side, do you think someone like me still needs a trial?
Wenger, hands in pockets, but with no pockets to actually use, kept repeating the motion, clearly not very happy inside.
But not angry either.
He had seen plenty of young players with difficult personalities; he was in a good mindset.
He was one of the "three great sages" of football who excelled at nurturing young talent.
Wenger’s trump card was a water-like demeanor.
Trigella’s trump card was his targeted technical training.
And Maxa’s trump card was making choices.
Choose the right major player to cling to tightly!
"That’s the way! Stay sharp! You’re doing great!" Maxa roared energetically near the microphone.
Trigella handled tactics while he was in charge of the atmosphere; they always cooperated happily.
Who else had such a magnetic, husky voice?
In the following period, Arsenal and Lisboa Sporting traded offensives and defenses.
Pires contributed a threatening shot, but the football did not curl enough, spinning outside the far post.
Conversely, Arsenal had no real answer to Ronaldo’s dribbling, a stable point for Lisboa Sporting on the right flank, providing a foundation for tactical diversity.
In the 39th minute.
Deng Kai helped Ronaldo play a one-two past Cole.
Vieira was also ready, pushing Ronaldo out of the way to make the tackle.
Deng Kai couldn’t let Vieira carry the ball and counterattack, so he went to ground with a sliding tackle.
The tall Vieira was sent flying.
But the main referee did not blow the whistle; he believed Deng Kai’s tackle was clean.
And indeed it was.
But the Arsenal players disagreed.
Parlour, Cole, and Keown among others rushed to the scene.
Deng Kai, seeing Vieira in some pain on the ground, reached out to help him up.
As if to ask, ’How are you feeling?’
’If you’re not hurt, let me give you a hand.’
On the side of Lisboa Sporting, the other players were wondering if they should go over and back up our young Deng.
But just then.
With a bang.
As Deng Kai bent down to help Vieira next to him, Cole with swift action gave the football a big kick out.
Because he saw Schmeichel was not in the penalty area!
