Chapter 311 Who can defeat Chen Xiaoliang? Everyone looked at him standing in hell!
Chen Xiaoliang, who returned to Rome overnight, was exhausted. In the Italian Cup match against Cremona, he was put on the substitute list by Mourinho.
He rushed back overnight not only because there was a game, but also because Enzo was leaving the club and the team held a simple farewell ceremony for him.
Many Roma fans also arrived outside the Trigoria base early in the morning, holding banners and posters to bid farewell to this player who had only been with the club for half a year but had brought many outstanding performances to the club.
As if hoping that a successor would inherit Enzo's performance, Mourinho transferred Enzo's No. 24 jersey to Perrone.
According to the existing rules of the Champions League, even if a player has played in the Champions League group stage for a club, he can still play in the Champions League knockout stage for his new club after the winter transfer window.
However, the rules limit the number of new players registered in the winter window to no more than three.
But with Enzo's performance, he will definitely be on Chelsea's squad for the Champions League knockout rounds.
Enzo himself felt that this transfer was like a dream. He was very grateful to Chen Xiaoliang, not only because his experience in Rome in the past six months was perfect and the team's performance was also excellent, but also because it was Chen Xiaoliang who rejected Chelsea's 150 million euro offer, so Chelsea turned to spend 120 million on him.
But he also knows that the road in the Premier League may not be easy. His new club spent an incredible 329.5 million euros in the winter window, a record-breaking astronomical figure that would have been unimaginable even in the summer window, to sign eight players in one go.
Enzo is just the most expensive one. Apart from him, there are other expensive newcomers such as Mudrick who costs 70 million euros, Badiasiler who costs 38 million euros, etc.
Among the eight players, the oldest is the 23-year-old Felix, who was loaned from Atletico Madrid for 11 million euros.
Chen Xiaoliang led all the players in the locker room to wish Enzo good luck on his journey and even made a good wish to meet in the Champions League final.
Then he watched Enzo leave the base building, get on a special car, and head to the airport.
After seeing him off, the team only did some stretching warm-up exercises in the afternoon and then took a bus to the Olympic Stadium in Rome.
The course of the game was not as simple as imagined. Although Cremona, the second-to-last team in the league, had limited strength, they were full of fighting spirit.
During the game, Dybala, who led the attacking line, felt discomfort in his legs after being tackled by the opponent's defender in the 43rd minute and was replaced by Mourinho with El Shaarawy.
Finally, in the 73rd minute of the second half, Smalling took advantage of the chaos in front of the goal after a corner kick and scored, helping the team win 1-0 and advance to the next round of the Italian Cup.
The team then rested for two days before facing Empoli in the league on February 5.
In this game, Mourinho seemed to want Perrone to integrate into the team as soon as possible. He rarely let Chen Xiaoliang partner with him as a double defensive midfielder and let Wijnaldum rush to the front.
To be on the safe side, Dybala's starting lineup was also replaced by Pellegrini, while Kva and Cesco were also rotated and did not start, and were replaced by Zalewski and Abraham.
Mourinho is certain that the core of this team lies in Chen Xiaoliang. As long as other players are in good shape and led by Chen Xiaoliang, the team's performance will not be too bad.
The result was in line with Mourinho's expectations. Chen Xiaoliang gave a perfect on-site teaching to the young Perrone, who was actually three years older than him. The course was called "How to Play as a Defensive Midfielder".
Although he was pulled into the captain's extra training group, Perrone, who was not as outspoken as Enzo, spent more time practicing with the "old seniors" such as Chen Xiaoliang, Kova and Cesco.
He doesn't have the arrogance that Enzo had when he first came to the team, "If you want to be my big brother, you have to beat me down first" and the courage to challenge Chen Xiaoliang in training.
But this does not mean that Perrone is a mediocre person. As the old players of Barcelona will say, Messi rarely spoke during training when he was young. He never liked to boast about himself with words, but only used football to prove everything.
Although Perrone did not perform so well, he has been trying hard to learn and adapt to Chen Xiaoliang's playing rhythm during the game.
Follow him to change positions, cooperate with him in defense, and combine with his support to participate in the offense.
It was not until the 75th minute that he was replaced by Volpato due to severe exhaustion.
After being substituted, he sat on the bench and watched in surprise as Chen Xiaoliang continued to run all over the field.
He didn't understand why, but he was shocked. This was a completely different feeling from watching the game through the screen. He couldn't feel the intensity of Serie A on the screen, nor could he understand how difficult it was in terms of physical strength and on-the-spot adaptability to run back and forth with Chen Xiaoliang.
Under Zhan Jun’s slogan “With Chen Xiaoliang at home, victory is guaranteed”, Roma finally defeated Empoli 2-0.
In the 21st minute, Ibanez scored directly with a header after receiving Pellegrini's corner kick, and in the 26th minute, Chen Xiaoliang suddenly made a cross from the right side of the penalty area, and Abraham swiftly inserted and shot into the goal.
After this game, the team finally had 7 days of rest.
The top four teams in the Italian Cup have all been decided. Roma, Juventus, Inter Milan and Fiorentina have advanced to the next round. Roma has drawn a good lot again and will play a two-legged semi-final against Fiorentina at home first and away. The winner will then advance to the final.
While Roma is in high spirits and performing brilliantly, over there on the island of Ibiza, the small team bought by Chen Xiaoliang has also achieved a series of winning streaks after signing several "big-name" players in the winter window. It is currently ranked third in its group in the Spanish League B, six places higher than before the winter window. With eight rounds left in the league, it has hope of reaching the promotion zone and participating in the group stage of Spanish League A, the third-tier league in Spain, next season.
But the expenses of a club, even a low-level club, are not a small amount. Taking into account that if there is a promotion next season, the value of outstanding players in La Liga A will be twice as much as that of La Liga B on average, in the range of 400,000 to 800,000 euros. Under Riise's arrangement, Chen Xiaoliang signed three more endorsements, namely the Rice mobile phone in the Red Country, a search engine developed by the Beautiful Country based on the latest Chat-Tpg technology, and the cover spokesperson for FIFA2023.
Since Mourinho owns some of the commercial image rights of the players on the team and he also knows where Chen Xiaoliang spends his money, the board of directors and coaching staff finally supported his off-field commercial endorsements, and the locker room would not say anything about their impeccable captain.
After a few days of rest, the whole team came to Lecce in southern Italy and played an away league game against newly promoted Lecce.
Although in the 7th minute of the game, Lecce took a corner kick from the right side into the Roma penalty area, and Ibanez, who had performed well in the previous game and scored a goal and continued to start in this game, "scored" again, but it was just his own goal, making the team fall behind 1-0. However, the obvious strength gap and stable team mentality allowed Roma to control the situation on the field and reverse the victory.
In the 16th minute, Dybala took a corner kick into the penalty area, Smalling headed the ball and hit the hand of Lecce right winger Strefezza, and the referee awarded a penalty.
Dybala scored in one fell swoop and equalized the score after just 9 minutes.
Roma then maintained its overall suppression, and in the 58th minute of the second half, in a quick counterattack, Chen Xiaoliang dribbled the ball from the right, and after reaching the penalty area, he attracted the attention of two defenders and Lecce goalkeeper Falcone, then made a cross pass to the left side, and Kva followed up and shot into the left post.
Roma maintained their winning streak with a 1-2 away victory.
After a 2-2 draw with AC Milan away in the 17th round, Roma won the next five league games.
Although Napoli did not stop its winning streak, the 6-point gap still remains there.
As Inter Milan was unexpectedly tied 0-0 by Sampdoria, the second-to-last team, in this round, Roma, with 59 points, is already 15 points ahead of Inter Milan, which is ranked third.
Roma has not lost since losing to Atalanta in the 7th round.
"Who can defeat Rome" has become a topic of discussion among major media in Italy.
After the three northern powers and Napoli failed to achieve this goal, everyone turned their attention to the Champions League.
After returning to Rome and resting for a day, on Valentine's Day, February 14, Chen Xiaoliang had to say goodbye to Helena early in the morning and board a flight to Dortmund, Westphalia, Germany.
If we talk about which team is the strongest in Germany, it is undoubtedly Bayern Munich, but if we talk about which team has the most fanatical fans, the Bundesliga champions will have to admit defeat when facing Dortmund.
The Germans did not resort to the dirty trick of beating drums and setting off fireworks outside the hotel late at night like the Neapolitans. Instead, they gathered hundreds of "suicide squads" who, in the February weather, held team flags, posters and slogans, and shouted slogans very obediently but loudly outside the training ground in Rome to intimidate the invading enemy.
The Hornets' head coach Terzic was born in 1982 and is a rare post-80s head coach in the first-tier teams in European football.
He has been working in Dortmund's coaching staff since 2010, during which time he also coached the U16 and U17 youth teams for a period of time. Later, he went to Besiktas, West Ham and other teams to gain rich experience. Finally, in 2020, he became the head coach of the Hornets from an assistant coach and won the German Cup that season.
Afterwards, the board of directors hired Marco Rose as head coach. After the end of the season, Rose also could not escape the fate of being fired. This time Terzic succeeded and became the official head coach.
Last summer, Dortmund sold Haaland, Akanji, Tiegs, Witsel, Burki and others one after another. As a European black shop that spends little money to achieve big things, Terzic and his team bought Ozcan, Modeste, Adeyemi, Haller, Schlotterbeck and other players with extremely high cost performance, completing the team renewal.
This season they are currently ranked second in the Bundesliga, only 2 points behind Bayern, and still have the possibility of competing for the championship.
At the pre-match press conference , Terzic showed absolute confidence in the team while also lowering his personal profile, saying that as a coach he still has a lot to learn from legends like Mourinho.
However, he focused more on several young players in the team. Bellingham, Adeyemi and Moukoko, these young people around 20 years old, all appeared in the starting lineup on the second night, and became the focus of Terzic's praise.
He repeatedly stated that although Bellingham's statistics of 4 goals and 4 assists this season are not as good as Chen Xiaoliang's, this is based on the team's personal positioning of him. Dortmund did not give Bellingham the same tactical freedom as Chen Xiaoliang.
The implication is that if given, Bellingham would not necessarily lose to Chen Xiaoliang.
Bellingham, who has been rumored to be linked with top clubs such as Real Madrid, Liverpool and Manchester United for a long time and is known to be Dortmund's next big-money deal, does not mind being compared to Chen Xiaoliang at all.
Chen Xiaoliang became a Glasgow Rangers legend at the age of 17 and had a named box at the home stadium. Compared with him, Bellingham is no worse. When he was 17 years old, his original parent team Birmingham City Club held a permanent retirement ceremony for his No. 22 jersey.
Like Chen Xiaoliang, Bellingham also became the youngest goalscorer in the club's 110-year history after coming to Dortmund.
Many people say that if it weren't for Barcelona's greater aura as a wealthy club, Bellingham would have snatched at least one of the Copa Awards and the Golden Boy Award from Pedri.
However, in addition to the intense preparations, Chen Xiaoliang also met a rare acquaintance. Erica, who was preparing for the European Summer Games in Germany, made a special trip to Dortmund to visit the Roma first team.
Even though he is 60 years old, Mourinho still smiled when he saw the beautiful woman coming, and joked with her, "This is Dortmund's part-time physical coach who is here to spy on the opponent's preparations."
Everyone else was familiar with the pair of sisters around Chen Xiaoliang. After all, Erica spent a long time last season at the Trigoria base for post-injury rehabilitation training.
But Dybala, Kva and Perrone all watched with their eyes wide open. The battle cries of the German strong men outside the training ground seemed to have turned into a gentle love song. The air, which was quite cold in February, also became ambiguous and soft.
None of these three people are married.
As a super handsome guy, Dybala's current and third public girlfriend Oriana is an Argentine singer with a very flamboyant personality. She once separated from Dybala for several months because of promoting a new song in Argentina. Then she told the media directly that she had not had that kind of life for a long time and could only support herself every day...
The story between Dybala and his first two girlfriends is even more outrageous. The first one, Antonella, was infatuated with him, but in the end, because he was too fickle, they finally parted ways after two breakups and two reunions.
The second one was an Italian black model, but Dybala, who was energetic and loved to trim flowers and plants, broke up with her after two months.
Italian domestic media bluntly stated that her demand was too strong and his supply was insufficient, so in order to avoid an early end to his football career, he had to leave early...
Then the model hooked up with Napoli winger Politano and almost broke up his family...
Kva, who was a simple man and became famous not long ago, has become much more well-behaved. His girlfriend is still studying at a medical school in Georgia. The two of them are very low-key and rarely show their affection to the outside world. The media cannot catch any gossip about them.
So Kwa just took a look, and that was all he did.
It's really pitiful. A 21-year-old player can already be famous all over the world, but a 21-year-old medical student still has a long way to go to get a diploma...
Not to mention Perrone, who has just arrived. He may have some fame in Argentina, but in Europe, few people know him at all.
It was the first time he saw a European beauty up close, and he was extremely excited.
As a result, the two Argentines, Dybala and Perrone, one old and one young, have been working very hard in training.
However, when you look at the crescent moon, the white moonlight is just sprinkled on you unintentionally.
In Erica's eyes, the handsome man from the East has already made her stare at him so much that she has no time to look at the handsome Argentine.
Mourinho, who was standing by, was a bystander who saw things more clearly. Having experienced the Eva incident at Chelsea, he had learned a lesson. In order to cheer up the team, he specially arranged a staff seat on the bench for Erica so that she could play with the team tomorrow.
Chen Xiaoliang was also well prepared for this competition.
With 26 training points from 7 days of training and extra practice, plus the 18 training points gained from the three league games against Napoli, Empoli and Lecce, he has currently accumulated a total of 108 training points.
He continued with the previous plan 1 and added strength.
Strong 16 → 17
Training value 108 → 28
If it only has speed and burst, it can only be called a sports car. If it has dual speed and is strong, it can become a high-speed train.
On the evening of February 16, in the hellish atmosphere of the Signal Iduna Park Stadium, which was renamed as the Westfalenstadion but more people still call it, Chen Xiaoliang led the entire team out of the player tunnel and onto the grass.
Every time the live announcer called out the name of a Roma player, he was not greeted with boos like other home teams, but with short "Woo-oh!" "Woo-oh!" intimidating sounds similar to the war cries of Vikings.
Chen Xiaoliang, who had just seen the huge TIFO of Napoli's home stadium, Maradona Stadium, not long ago, was once again shocked by the huge TIFO of Europe's most devilish home stadium.
Others' TIFO is just big at best, made up of thousands of fans, while Dortmund's is not only big, but the well-trained and well-coordinated fans can also make the TIFO move.
A head with a sinister smile and holding a telescope slowly rose from the stands surrounded by yellow smoke, and it seemed that the telescope was aiming at the players of the visiting team.
And there is a line below:
"Auf den spuren des verlorenen henkelpotts."
Chen Xiaoliang, who is fluent in German, knew at a glance that it meant "on the road to find the lost Champions League trophy."
Since Helena and Erica's grandfather Hitzfeld led them to win the Champions League in 1997, the club has reached the final but has never won the Champions League again.
This TIFO was also made by fans specifically for the Champions League.
Incredibly, it was made by 15,000 die-hard fans in the South Stand using the small boards they had in their hands.
84,000 people, the largest stadium in Germany, a UEFA five-star stadium, the south stand diehard area, where TIFO is lit, can accommodate 24,000 people, and is the largest single-sided stand in Europe.
The yellow fireworks surrounding the entire stadium created an extreme atmosphere, warning all members of the visiting team who had come from afar that this was Westphalia, the Ruhr industrial area, and whether before or after the war, it was the industrial heart of this old empire.
From 1935 to 2006, the German national team never lost any game in this stadium in 71 years.
People here don't talk about history. People from the working class don't have a long history like Rome, which goes back two thousand years.
Their fathers held hammers in their hands, had blood stained with coal dust flowing in their veins, and what they pounded out with every hammer and every furnace was a torrent of steel that made their industrial empire more powerful than Europe.
Just one word: do it!
And in this devil's home stadium, Bellingham was just opposite the center circle, and together with his teammates in yellow jerseys, they were ready to fight at any time, waiting for Roma to taste the taste of hell.
