Chapter 388 Gerrard: I applaud your victory today, but I just hope you lose in the next game
Truth cannot be hidden. Although Manchester United took advantage of the opportunity of playing away from home to hold talks with Lazio and Milinkovic-Savic with the full cooperation of Riise, Solskjaer and others, the news was leaked by Di Marzio and Romano just 2 hours before the game.
At first, Lazio fans did not believe it. Although they knew that Milinkovic-Savic's contract, which had not been renewed with the club, would only have six months left, according to transfer rules, players with only six months left on their contracts could unconditionally conduct free transfer negotiations with other clubs, and then transfer to a new club after the contract expires. However, most of them still believed that this was just a trick used by Manchester United to disrupt morale in order to win all three points and chase the top spot in the group.
But Lazio head coach Sarri knew full well that the club was about to agree the €10 million transfer.
Compared to a free transfer six months later, earning 10 million euros in the winter window is already a huge compensation for this Serie A team.
In addition, as the team is currently ranked only fifth in Serie A, behind Inter Milan, Juventus, Napoli and Roma, Sarri simply gave up the game and did not send Milinkovic-Savic to the field, citing a temporary injury as the reason.
In the last game, Chen Xiaoliang gained 7 training points (142→149 ) and 1 breakthrough point (34→35).
Manchester United still basically plays with all the main players:
The starting goalkeeper position was given to Livakovic, , so that the 33-year-old De Gea could be rotated for one game;
The back four is Wan-Bissaka, Maguire, Lima and Dalot;
Compared to the faster-paced Premier League, Serie A teams prefer positional attacking play, which also gave Maguire a long-awaited opportunity to start in the Champions League;
The double defensive midfielders are Eriksson and Casemiro, and the attacking midfielder is given to Bruno Fernandes;
Chen Xiaoliang appeared in the starting right winger position, complementing Kva on the left, with Cesco in the middle.
In this lineup, Eriksen, Dalot, and the Roma trio are all players who have played in Serie A and achieved success. Ten Hag used familiar players instead of new ones and simply used "Intent" to counter "Intent", especially on the offensive end, basically betting on the Roma trio.
After both sides entered the stadium, Lazio fans gave the loudest boos when Chen Xiaoliang's name was announced on the live broadcast.
Once you become sworn enemies in the same city, you will never reconcile with each other.
But along with the boos, there were also a lot of cheers.
This is Rome, not just Lazio. Countless Roma fans heard that their red cardinal had returned. Those who bought tickets arrived early, ready to pay homage, while those who couldn't buy tickets gathered in Piazza Venezia, Piazza della Signoria, Piazza Barberini, and even outside the Olympic Stadium, watching the big screen in the square and the small screen in the bar, once again experiencing the style of the former Roma captain up close.
After both sides finished guessing the sides and stood on both sides, Chen Xiaoliang raised his hands to salute the fans who were wearing his jerseys and holding his posters, expressing his sincere gratitude.
This was once his city, the place where he shouted "I came, I saw, I conquered". Helping Roma fans defeat their city rivals once again is the best thing he can do for those who still follow him while wearing the Manchester United jersey.
Five minutes into the game, he made a surprising move.
He let B Fedor, who played as a front midfielder , go to the left flank to help Kvar get rid of Lazari, who had good speed and flexibility but lacked confrontation and strength. Here, he only needed Dalot to support him from behind, and he could break through the entire wing.
If this was said in August when the Premier League just started, Bruno Fernandes would definitely sneer and look down upon it. But now, Bruno Fernandes deeply understands one thing, that is, a dragon has to coil itself up and a tiger has to lie down. There is no need to say much about who Chen Xiaoliang is. Winning the Golden Ball at the age of 19 is simply groundbreaking. As someone who has practiced one-on-one with him, I almost doubt what he has achieved in these twenty years of training.
No matter what pose someone asks you to strike, just do it obediently. Don't just stand there stupidly and disturb others' performance.
Therefore, B Fee basically only did two things in this game:
1. Support Kva in the left flank and pass the ball to Kva when there is an opportunity;
2. Support Kva on the left flank, and if there is no chance to support, pass the ball to Chen Xiaoliang on the right.
Lazio's left back Hysaj and left midfielder Alberto were in tears today. How could this beast start as a right winger today? It was really bad luck to play against him.
In the 7th minute, Eriksen made a diagonal pass to the right center line area. Chen Xiaoliang retreated to get the ball. Lazio left winger Zaccani was about to retreat to defend, but Chen Xiaoliang rushed to the front court with the ball.
Alberto blocked the road and retreated at the same time. After retreating three meters, he found that he could not retreat any further because he would be overtaken.
This mode of defending one by one is not only the favorite of Chen Xiaoliang, but also the favorite of all offensive players with extraordinary abilities.
After piercing Rice's crotch three times in a row in the match against Arsenal, Chen Xiaoliang became addicted to piercing the crotch.
When overtaking from the side, the opponent player needs to half turn and chase back, but when passing the ball through the crotch, not only will it be easy for the opponent to lose track of where the ball has gone, but it will also require a complete turn to chase back.
As Alberto approached and stepped out with his right leg, Chen Xiaoliang pushed the ball with his left foot, and the ball passed under Alberto's crotch...
“Ahaha!”
The Roma fans and Manchester United fans in the stands cheered at the same time. Chen Xiaoliang flashed forward along Alberto's body. Facing Hysaj in front of him, he cut inside and rushed towards the defense area of left center back Romagnoli.
Sarri's goal tonight was to save his strength for the league match against Juventus on Sunday night, but he still fielded most of the main players. Although there was no requirement to win, he absolutely could not accept a tragic outcome.
If both sides could get 1 point each, it would be the perfect outcome.
It is enough to just participate in the six group matches of the Champions League. You can get a bonus of 40 to 50 million euros, which is enough to add some new players with high cost performance. As for the Europa League and the UEFA Cup, whoever wants to go can go. If you work hard to be in the top four in the league, you can continue to participate in the Champions League group stage next year.
With this mentality, it is unrealistic to expect the players to fight hard on the field. Therefore, when Romagnoli saw Chen Xiaoliang coming fiercely, he did not choose to defend toughly, but just moved sideways and tried his best to block Chen Xiaoliang's shooting space together with the midfielder Becino who came to help.
Uruguayan international Becino is not the team's starting main player. Although the 32-year-old has participated in all three World Cup games, his market value is only 4.5 million euros. He started tonight because Milinkovic-Savic did not play, so he must show himself.
He put one hand on Chen Xiaoliang's shoulder, not caring whether it was a foul or not, he just wanted to stop the Red Devils captain from moving forward.
However, next to him, the experienced Romagnoli still only blocked but did not block, only watched but did not steal. It seemed that with Becino's close defense, he had more reason to pretend.
Seeing this scene, many fans in London said that Kaku's departure from Milan and Serie A made Roma sad and they had lost their former glory.
Chen Xiaoliang raised his left hand to block Becino and continued to move forward a few steps.
Seeing that Becino's interference seemed to be effective, Romagnoli stopped retreating and tried to stand in place to block Chen Xiaoliang's advance path.
Just when the two were about to collide with each other within 3 meters, the left-back Hisai who was pulling inwards to double-team was about to pounce, but Chen Xiaoliang pushed the ball to the far corner with his right foot one step outside the penalty area!
The speed of the ball was not slow, but not fast enough to be shot. It was a pass!
Romagnoli, Becino and Hysaj's attention was instantly attracted by the rolling ball!
In the middle of the penalty area, Cesco rushed to the far post. Another central defender, Casale, stuck to him closely. He was 191cm tall and weighed 83kg. He was afraid that he would be humiliated in person by the Manchester United center forward, so he stayed inside to prevent Cesco from receiving Chen Xiaoliang's diagonal pass.
However, as soon as the ball rolled to the penalty spot, a figure jumped out.
It’s not Cesco’s No. 9, nor Chen Xiaoliang’s No. 7, nor B Fee’s No. 8, but No. 77 Kvaratskhelia!
Although Romagnoli was not very motivated, he was still an excellent central defender as he came from the Roma youth training and had spent 7 years in AC Milan. Driven by the subconscious reaction of his body muscles, he moved sideways and blocked Kova in front of the ball to prevent him from shooting as soon as he received the ball.
But Kwa was not affected by his blockade. He met the ball on the left side of the penalty spot, without stopping the ball, he touched the ball with his right foot!
But the direction was not towards the goal, but the ball was pushed deeper to the right side of the penalty area!
This made everyone react. Becino, who was behind Chen Xiaoliang just now, and Hisai, who was beside him, looked again and found that Chen Xiaoliang was gone!
Just like the "Misdirection" used by a magician, he used a pass-like shot to a key position in the penalty area while being double-teamed by three people, instantly making all the defensive players focus on the ball and ignore his own existence!
Just after passing the ball, Romagnoli instantly stepped back sideways, and Chen Xiaoliang simultaneously moved forward silently to the front right.
The ball was there, and the two-on-three cooperation with Kva was completed. At this time, he had already received the ball outside the right corner of the small penalty area!
Lazio goalkeeper Provedel, who thought Kva was going to shoot from the center half a second ago, immediately dived to his left and tried to block the near corner.
Chen Xiaoliang swung his right leg back, stretched out his left arm, and leaned his body slightly to the left!
Su Dong: "Xiao Liang shoots~~~~~~~~~~~~!!!"
"Not a shot!"
"Cesco at the back post!"
"Wow! It's so easy to push the ball forward!"
"The three Manchester United attackers passed the ball continuously in the penalty area, causing the six Lazio defenders in the penalty area to passively follow the ball."
"Everyone thought Xiaoliang was going to shoot from the right side of the penalty area, but he pushed the ball towards the back post."
"Lazio goalkeeper Provedel was hit in the opposite direction. His center of gravity was still moving towards the near post, so he could no longer make a reverse save. The central defender Casale at the far post also thought that Xiaoliang would shoot, so he completely relaxed his defense against Sesco. Sesco rushed to the front of the goal easily, blocked the ball with his right foot, and easily blocked the ball into the goal!"
"0-1! Manchester United scored first away from home!"
Zhang Lu: "This ball is so beautiful. Three people, three passes and two knockdowns, it almost looks like it went into the goal."
"I felt that Lazio was absent-minded. They were the typical team that focused on the ball instead of the players. The entire defense seemed a little absent-minded. Except for a few people, the others didn't want to make any moves or try too hard. In short, tonight was just a time to clock in and out when the 90 minutes were up."
Su Dong: "My colleague Zhan Jun is commentating another important game tonight, Manchester City's away game against Inter Milan, so I also have a long-awaited opportunity to cooperate with coach Zhang Lu!"
"I have to mention here that in 2005, Coach Zhang was awarded the Italian 'Knight of the Star of Benevolence' by the Italian ambassador in recognition of his outstanding role in promoting Serie A in China. He is the only person in the domestic sports world to have received this medal. I wonder what Coach Zhang thinks of the current Serie A after 18 years?"
Zhang Lu: "Hehe, a hero doesn't brag about his past achievements. As for the current Serie A... it's hard to describe in a few words."
As the two commentators chatted, the barrage of comments and comments in the live broadcast room of the game began to pile up like crazy as the goals were scored.
Not only in the Red Country live broadcast room, but also in the live broadcast rooms of various countries watching this game, except for a very small number of fans who were not sure whether they were Lazio fans or fans against Manchester United, all other fans stood on the side of Manchester United, even including a large number of Serie A fans.
They are extremely disgusted with Lazio's poor performance in European competitions, and even their passive behavior of actively avoiding war and maintaining the league. Many fans even call them "garbage Lazio", and think that they are not worthy of appearing in the supreme hall of the Champions League.
In the stands, half of the fans were criticizing Manchester United, while the other half were cheering for them.
In another match in the same group that took place earlier, Bayern beat PSV Eindhoven 2-0 at home, with 4 wins, 1 draw and 13 points. Even if Manchester United wins this game, they will still have 3 wins, 2 draws and 11 points. As long as Bayern remain undefeated in the final round at Old Trafford, they can maintain their first place, while Manchester United must win two consecutive games, including this game, to overtake and take the top spot in the group.
So when the game was restarted after the celebration, Manchester United players were even more motivated, as they wanted to end the suspense of the game as quickly as possible.
The more motivated Manchester United was, the more cautious Lazio became. They played with restrained hands and feet, and all they thought about was losing as few games as possible and avoiding injuries.
Even though the captain Immobile, who was at the front, shouted to encourage his players several times, it was of no avail.
It’s hard to lead a team if people’s morale is low.
In the 39th minute, B Fee took a corner kick from the right.
In the match against Arsenal, Chen Xiaoliang's performance in the penalty area like a spring man forced Lazio to assign someone to defend him. Instead, they ignored Maguire and only sent Romagnoli to defend him.
How could Romagnoli, who was just punching in for work, be competitive with Maguire, who was determined to prove himself? In the aerial confrontation after jumping, Maguire managed to push away Roma and headed the ball into the goal at the back post, scoring his long-awaited Champions League goal.
With a height of 179cm, Timber cannot play the role of a high center back in the air, but as he can play as a full-back and a defensive midfielder, he does not have to worry about not having a place in the team.
Ten Hag originally wanted to sign Napoli's South Korean central defender Kim Min-jae in the summer, but on the one hand, Napoli's chairman, De Laurentiis, who is as weird as Levy, insisted on the player's 60 million euros release clause and refused to accept installments;
On the other hand, Maguire is unwilling to leave the team, and it is impossible to recover funds and reduce salary expenses by selling him. At the same time, after spending 300 million to buy the Roma trio, it is no longer possible to pay a one-time transfer fee of 60 million euros while satisfying the fiscal balance bill.
So he had to give up, but Ten Hag did not completely give up on the Korean central defender, and Maguire knew it.
As long as he nods, there are plenty of Premier League teams that want him, and Manchester United is also willing to pay a certain amount of compensation to help him reduce the loss of salary.
People fight for their pride and Buddha accepts their loyalty. He still wants to prove himself at the age of 30.
After scoring the goal, he was so excited that he even rushed to the Lazio fans' stand to celebrate, and was instantly attacked by a rain of beverage cups and plastic bottles.
But as the saying goes, big head, big head, no worries when it rains, others have umbrellas, I have a big head...
The other teammates ran away to avoid it, but he stretched out his hand, shook his hair back, and turned back in a cool manner.
There was no conversation in the midfield. After returning in the second half, Lazio, who had no intention of continuing the fight, basically tried hard to prevent the game from becoming a tragedy.
Sarri even replaced Romagnoli, Lazzari, Immobile and others for the next game against Juventus.
If you can't act well, then just give up and throw the pot away.
The wing attack was originally harmless, and with Chen Xiaoliang playing as a right winger today, moving back and forth on the right side, the three Lazio players stationed on this side were completely overwhelmed.
In the heat map displayed in real time during the game, Lazio's attack on the left was almost colorless, and the red hot spots where the ball was concentrated were all on the right side of the center.
In the 62nd minute, Chen Xiaoliang passed the ball on the right, dribbled past the panic-stricken Hysaj, and then made a cross from the bottom. He used the simplest trick to help Cesco score with a header and score his second goal.
Just two minutes later, Eriksen took a free kick from the left, Casemiro jumped at the back post and scored another header.
With 4 goals and 3 headers, they once again became Manchester's header team and finally won all 3 points away from home without any effort.
Ten Hag, who gradually began to understand how to get along with superstars, replaced Chen Xiaoliang with young player Menou in the 91st minute of stoppage time, allowing him to receive the cheers and blessings of his fans alone in this stadium where he had struggled for two seasons.
After five rounds of matches, Bayern scored 11 goals and conceded 4 goals, Manchester United scored 10 goals and conceded 3 goals, and both teams had a goal difference of 7. The final ranking results will all depend on the last round of the group stage on December 15.
Although Chen Xiaoliang did not score a goal in this game, he had 2 assists, dominated the wing alone, had 4 steals, 2 interceptions, 2 successful headers and 8 successful dribbles, and his excellent offensive and defensive performance earned him a high score of 9.7 and he was named the best player of the game.
Gained 14 skill points (70→84) and 2 breakthrough points (35→37).
The training points can be saved for now, but the skill points can already be exchanged.
Although his LV4 right winger position attributes cannot fully utilize all his personal attributes, he is generally satisfied with his performance as a full-time starting right winger in this game, so he decided to use 70 skill points plus De Bruyne's skill training package to unlock the skill [Adept at dribbling on the right] (skill value 84→14).
Unlocking this skill will slightly improve his performance when dribbling on the right, and will also slightly increase his physical energy consumption when attacking on the right. It will be effective even if he does not play as a right winger.
A little after the game, the next day, Chen Xiaoliang had a quick breakfast with Gerrard, but the two did not have much time together.
Gerrard watched the whole game in the box last night. He didn't know whether to be happy or sad.
As a person who was born and raised on Merseyside, he was taught to hate everything about Manchester United, but his favorite player went to Manchester United.
Therefore, the two of them had breakfast alone in the hotel where Chen Xiaoliang was staying. Gerrard did not want to have any open contact with anyone else in Manchester United.
But he told Chen Xiaoliang that he would go to Old Trafford in 10 days.
The entire Manchester United team took the flight on time at 12 noon. Instead of returning to Manchester, they flew directly to London and then took a bus to Brighton, 80 kilometers away. Two days later, they will challenge the Seagulls away here.
Although Brighton is not an easy opponent, after selling a number of stars such as Kaori Mitomata and Caicedo in the summer, they are still performing well this season and are currently ranked 9th in the league. In the last round, they only allowed the Blue Moon to win against Manchester City with a last-minute goal. It will not be easy for Manchester United to win all away games.
But the highlight is not here.
There are still 10 days left, and the whole of England has begun to prepare for the situation, and the media has also begun to create and exaggerate the atmosphere.
What kind of reason would make Gerrard willing to show up at Old Trafford to watch Manchester United's game?
You know, as long as he appears there, he will be endlessly ridiculed by Manchester United fans.
He, who had almost never said anything harsh to Chen Xiaoliang, had already informed Chen Xiaoliang in advance that if Chen Xiaoliang lost the game, he would not only not be sad, but would also cheer loudly without reservation.
A century of feud, the 213th Manchester derby and England's national derby are about to begin!
