Chapter 25: It's a pity we met too late
With curly hair that has a strong Spanish style, Juanma Lillo's first impression on Yang Hao is that he looks a bit like Mark Ruffage, the actor who plays the Hulk in "The Avengers".
Both of them have a strong academic temperament.
Juanma Lillo is also a very cheerful and optimistic person. He has been smiling since we met.
Yang Hao met him in his office. Parales brought him coffee and the two started chatting.
The topic started with Guardiola.
Juanma Lillo said that Guardiola called him last night and talked to him about this matter for a long time.
"He spoke very highly of your game last night," said Juanma Lillo.
Yang Hao also took this opportunity to change the topic and talked about last night's game.
Lillo believes that Atletico's pressing in the frontcourt was not good enough throughout the game.
"If the pressing in the frontcourt was done better, Barcelona would not have conceded only four goals last night."
Yang Hao also agreed with this, but he also said that there was nothing he could do about it.
First of all, he couldn't ask Hasselbaink to keep pressing and oppressing, which was unrealistic.
To put it nicely, the Dutch center's personality is straightforward, and to put it bluntly, he is willful, so you have to go along with him.
If Yang Hao asked him to put more energy into pressing and oppressing, regardless of whether Hasselbaink could do it, the Dutchman would probably be annoyed, and then Yang Hao's job would be even more difficult.
"I'm not the boss in the locker room yet, and sometimes my words don't count." Yang Hao was very frank.
Juanma Lillo expressed his understanding.
Decisive and ruthless behavior was very common in the football novels Yang Hao wrote in his previous life, but it was actually impossible to do so.
Just like Van Gaal, ruthless and decisive enough, right?
What's the result?
Now not only Rivaldo and the local players are dissatisfied with him, but even Kluivert, his direct descendant, is dissatisfied with him.
Managing the locker room is a management issue and cannot be resolved with a single decisive decision.
If you "kill" everyone, who will compete for you?
Even if they listen to you on the surface, but actually go against your will and collude with you on the court, what can you do?
Aren’t there enough head coaches who have been killed by players?
Not to mention Hasselbaink, even if it was Belleron, if he really asked him to put more energy into defense and pressing, Yang Hao guaranteed that Belleron would immediately get angry.
I can’t do it!
The style of play that Yang Hao is adopting now is actually a compromise, and he must compromise.
However, Yang Hao also admitted that he is indeed not good at training players, and even the Atletico Madrid coaching staff now lacks experts in this area. This is why he hopes Juanma Lillo will come to help him.
Even Guardiola praised this guy's training methods.
Juanma Lillo was naturally aware of all this, after all, he had discussed this issue with Little Hill when they met before.
Yang Hao is looking for an assistant coach who can handle specific matters such as training. In the future, the head coach will be responsible for coordinating the overall situation.
This suits him very well.
…
Yang Hao gave a very frank introduction to the situation of Atletico Madrid and the problems he faced. Juanma Lillo also talked a lot about himself, such as the team he coached and the problems he faced in his past few teams.
The 4231 tactics advocated by Lillo are very interesting and different from those of Irureta, Benítez and others.
He advocates passing and cutting, high-pressure pressing and fast-paced offense and defense.
If we look back in 2000, we certainly won’t notice anything. But if we look back in 2023, we will find that Lillo’s philosophy is so advanced that it is impossible to achieve it in any team he coached.
A player's ability and technical characteristics are one thing, but physical fitness is more important.
Lillo said that it is difficult to do this whether in the lower-level leagues or in the Spanish Second Division or La Liga, including teams like Tenerife. It is easy for players to encounter embarrassing situations where their physical energy is exhausted to a certain extent during the game and they are beaten badly by their opponents.
This was also true in the match against Barcelona where we lost 2-4.
When they were in good physical condition, they could suppress Barcelona, but when their physical condition declined, they were immediately beaten into a sieve by Barcelona.
So later, after discovering this problem, many teams started to play in this regard.
Juanma Lillo even felt that the reason he did not get the opportunity to coach was because he was too passive in this regard. As soon as everyone saw him, they knew how to beat him.
Yang Hao laughed out loud when he heard this. This was indeed very embarrassing.
However, Yang Hao is still very sure of Juanma Lillo's ideas. He believes that with the development of science and technology and the improvement of training level, the physical fitness of players will also improve.
"I don't know if it's achievable at the current level, but in a few years, it won't be uncommon for every player on the team to run more than 10 kilometers per game. By then, your concept will be realized."
"10 kilometers?" Juanma Lillo was shocked.
With the current slow-paced style of play, especially in La Liga, it is considered quite good if each player can run eight or nine kilometers per game.
"Yes, and for the entire season." Yang Hao was very sure.
Because he saw it happen with his own eyes.
Juanma Lillo was frightened, because he knew very well that increasing the average of eight or nine kilometers per game to 10 kilometers per game might not seem like a big deal, but if it is magnified to the entire team, it is equivalent to having one more person running.
You can imagine, if it was 12 against 11 the whole time, how big of an advantage would that be?
In addition, Yang Hao also mentioned Bielsa.
There is a very important part in Bielsa's football philosophy, which is rotation.
To put it simply, the players in the frontcourt take turns to press the ball, and the others use this time to have a good rest.
Juanma Lillo had noticed Bielsa a long time ago, so he has been following the games of the Argentina national team.
…
After a really in-depth conversation, it was found that Yang Hao and Juanma Lillo actually had a lot in common.
For example , they all dislike slow ball control, prefer fast tempo, passing and cutting, and high-pressure pressing.
Yang Hao believes that the tactical trends in the next few years will be more meticulous, the responsibilities of the players on the field will be more detailed, and the division of labor will be more refined, which will place higher demands on the head coach and coaching staff.
Not only that, the offensive and defensive rhythm will become faster and faster.
Li Luo immediately grasped a key factor in Yang Hao's words, which was defense.
"Do you think that the team's defensive level will get better and better in the next few years?"
Yang Hao was stunned at first and didn't quite catch what was going on, but he quickly figured it out.
Why is the rhythm of offense and defense getting faster and faster?
Because we need to create a time difference in the transition from offense to defense.
So why the time difference?
Because the opponent's defense level is very high, once they are in position, it is difficult to break through.
I have to say, Li Luo’s brain works really fast!
"Indeed, more and more head coaches are adopting Sacchi's defensive philosophy. In the next few years, the defensive level of Europe's top leagues will be far better than it is now," said Yang Hao.
Who would have thought that Porto from the Portuguese Super League and Monaco from Ligue 1 would meet in the Champions League final?
Who would have thought that Greece could win the European Cup?
The reason these three teams were able to sweep across Europe was because of their defense.
Even before the 2004 Champions League final, the 2003 Champions League final was the famous "classic" duel in which AC Milan and Juventus both lost.
Yang Hao also followed Li Luo's line of thought and continued to elaborate on some of his own ideas.
Because he had witnessed it with his own eyes in his previous life, his tone seemed particularly certain, which surprised Li Luo.
More importantly, Yang Hao's logic is very harmonious.
For example, Yang Hao believes that the level of defense will be greatly improved, which will inevitably bring about another problem, that is, offensive attack.
Once the opponent is in position and has organized their defense, how do you play?
Yang Hao believes that there are two types. One is ball control, which is to stretch the defense line by constantly passing the ball, forcing the opponent's defense line to expose loopholes during movement.
Another type is horizontal and diagonal long passes.
There is no need to say much about the former. The whole world knows that this is how the world team Barcelona plays. This requires very high passing and ball control skills from the players, and they must also be able to convert ball control into offensive threats at critical moments.
Messi and Iniesta!
The latter is also not uncommon. For example, Xabi Alonso, Pirlo, Scholes, Toni Kroos and other outstanding long pass masters can transfer the ball from the densely defended area to the loose area in the shortest time.
Another one is the offensive routine that Barcelona was best at Ronaldinho dribbled the ball to the ribs on the left and then made a diagonal pass to Eto'o and the right winger.
And all of this is for the purpose of transfer.
Because of the transfer, another change will follow. The wingers will become more and more important, especially the full-backs.
No matter how the tactics change, the center will always be the most densely defended area, and the most space must be on the wing.
Even if the team with the best defense can take care of the middle and one of the wing, the other wing will be open.
Therefore, this shift will inevitably be accompanied by the rise of full-backs.
And he is not a full-back like Carlos and Cafu, but the kind of full-back with strong offensive and organizational abilities.
…
As a time traveler, he has a 23-year head start. He was also a football writer in his previous life. Although he failed miserably, he did a lot of homework and consulted countless materials.
In terms of professionalism, Yang Hao is definitely not as good as Juanma Lillo, but in terms of the overall view, especially in the technical and tactical development trends, Yang Hao completely defeated Lillo, who has advanced ideas.
In fact, many times, his casual words would shock Nengliluo so much that he would exclaim that it was impossible.
But after Yang Hao's guidance and his own thinking, he immediately understood.
This immediately made his eyes look at Yang Hao constantly changing, and the complex emotions of shock, admiration, respect, curiosity, etc. in them became stronger and stronger. In the end, he even had the urge to bow down in worship.
So after the two chatted for about an hour, when Yang Hao was about to go to the coach's office for a meeting, Juanma Lillo suddenly smiled bitterly.
"I don't know why, but I suddenly feel like I can't coach anymore." The Spaniard smiled bitterly.
Yang Hao laughed and put his arm around his shoulder, "It doesn't matter if you don't know how to do it, as long as I can do it."
The two met too late.
