Rebirth 1994: Football Situation

Chapter 762 Perseverance
It seems that after knocking out Bayern, Newcastle's luck ran out.

In the first round against Chelsea, although the opponent's defense was impeccable, Newcastle did not have a chance to score. It is a pity that luck was not on their side. Newcastle missed at least three times in that game. A chance to kill your opponent.

In this game, both Newcastle and Chelsea had similar scoring opportunities, but Drogba's shot stopped on the goal line, while Toni's shot was only over the goal line before being kicked by Maicon. Kick it out - the difference between the two shots was only a little bit, but it made the difference between the two sides' score advantage by two goals.

But how could Mourinho give up his desire to win because of this?He wants to accomplish a feat that no one has ever accomplished since the restructuring of the Champions Cup, and that is to lead the team to defend the Champions Cup!You must know that since the establishment of the Champions League in 1956, only Real Madrid's Villalonga and Carnilla, the legendary coach of Benfica, the Hungarian "Wizard" Gutman, and the great Inter Milan era have been able to do this. Argentine coach "Magic" Herrera, Ajax's Romanian coach Kovac, Bayern's legendary coach Kramer, Liverpool's greatest coach after Shankly Paisley, Nottingham Forest's "King" Clough and Sacchi of AC Milan is just a few people.

Of course, Benitez can't give up. If he can lead Chelsea to win the Champions League this season, he will become the second person in the history of European football to lead his team to win the UEFA Cup and Champions Cup. Before him, only Liverpool Paisley has done it, and he is the only No.1 who led two different teams to win the UEFA Cup and Champions Cup consecutively!
No one will easily let go of such an honor, which is enough to engrave one's name in the history of European football.

Mourinho looked at his watch. It was already No. 404 minutes in the first half. The first half will end soon. The intermission will be the time for him to make adjustments and regain the situation.

I just hope that nothing else will happen in the remaining few minutes...

Just as Mourinho was thinking this way, Drogba fell to the ground holding his calf in a fight. After a few seconds, he got up, and then jumped to the sidelines on one leg and began to receive treatment.

Seeing Drogba fall to the ground, Mourinho's heart tightened, seeing Drogba get up, Mourinho's heart relaxed-then seeing Drogba jumping to the sidelines with one leg, Mourinho O knew something was wrong.

If it is not serious, Drogba can walk to the sidelines slowly by himself, but now he "jumps" out with one foot. From this, it can be seen that Drogba is afraid to let his injured left foot touch the ground now. .

Mourinho scanned the bench with his eyes. If two substitutions are used up because of injuries, it will have a great impact on his subsequent tactical arrangements.

What's more terrible is that Shearer was injured in the training before the start of the game. Now the two forwards on the bench, Larson and Walcott, can't replace Drogba. The ball is not very good, and Drogba's header ability is the most powerful weapon to score goals in the current situation. If he goes off the field and let Larson, who is less able to confront, or Walcott, who is more like a winger, play, then Newcastle's header ability in the penalty area has dropped too much.

Like the current situation of the game, Mourinho would rather Ibrahimovic get injured than Drogba get injured, because if Ibrahimovic is injured, someone will be replaced, or he can simply play three forwards after Walcott.

Fortunately, after the treatment, Drogba limped back to the field. After asking the team doctor, he knew that Drogba was only temporarily contused. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Under such field conditions, a player like Drogba with a strong body and excellent header is exactly what Newcastle needs. If he goes off the field, I am afraid that Mourinho will have no choice but to push Lucio to the forward line. One move.

Just 1 minute after Drogba returned to the field, the referee Mitchell blew the whistle for the end of the first half.

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"Didier, how is your foot...?"

After returning to the locker room, Mourinho's first sentence was to ask about Drogba's situation.

"Fortunately, boss." Drogba grinned: "At the beginning I thought my leg was finished, it hurts badly... But now it doesn't hurt anymore, James (team doctor) said it was just a mild contusion That's all, just take a break."

Mourinho was completely relieved. This injury looked serious at first, but healed quickly, and it should not affect the second half of the game.

He straightened up, looked at his watch, and found that it was only 5 minutes before the start of the second half, so he clapped his hands to let everyone's attention focus on himself.

"In the first half of the game, we didn't play well enough." Mourinho picked up a game statistics: "In the first half of the game, we only had three shots, and the most threatening one was Didier's one. Shot, unfortunately, lacked a bit of luck."

Hearing this, the players all laughed, it was really just a lack of luck.

"Since luck didn't favor us, let's forget it, lest someone say that we only rely on luck to get to this point." Mourinho waved his hand: "Now what we want to prove is that we definitely don't rely on luck alone to advance. , even if luck is not on our side, we will definitely not stop here."

Mourinho smiled easily, with strong self-confidence in his tone. His performance infected the players, and the atmosphere in the locker room became active-this is exactly what Mourinho hoped to see, If Newcastle were still in a backwater, they would have absolutely no chance in the second half.

"In the second half, we have to play more openly, with long passes and fast counterattacks. Nie, you should lean more in the middle, hand over to Douglas on the right, and Michael fills in for Douglas. We have to live on both sides, Douglas, Jordan , this task is entrusted to you.”

Maicon and Stewart nodded at the same time. After Ribery was injured, the reason Mourinho sent Stewart was because of his speed, otherwise he would not have put the more experienced Robert on the bench. On the court, speed is more important than technique.

"Don't forget we're a Premier League team and we're good at playing high and high. The pitch affects Chelsea too, especially when they're defending. Let me bomb their goals until they score!"

"Okay guys... now you know what we're in, for us in the second half we've got to score at least one goal in the second half and don't let Chelsea score in order to get to the final and if that's not the case , then we will lose the opportunity to reach the Champions League for two consecutive years, and even lose the feat of winning the Champions League twice...lost the opportunity to leave our name forever in the history of European football."

Speaking of this, Mourinho observed the expressions of the players. Obviously, the emotions of the players have been slowly mobilized by him, and their eyes are shining.

"Now, let's go, there are 45 minutes left, whether to make history or be defeated by history, it is within these 45 minutes of performance!"

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After the start of the second half, the two sides began to fight more in the front of the two penalty areas, and vacated the area near the center circle. Basically, after getting the ball in the backcourt, no one took it, but directly launched the attack with a long pass.

Newcastle is because they want to seize any time to strengthen the attack, and the long pass is the most concise and fast attack method. As for Chelsea, it is because Newcastle's attack is fierce, and if they hesitate to take the ball in the backcourt, they are likely to make mistakes. The way to play the ball.

If the field is in good condition, Benitez will probably let the players use the method of holding the ball in the backcourt to pass the time, but now the slippery field does not allow him to do so, and the situation of this field is just right. An important factor for Chelsea to score a leading goal. This situation is indeed extremely subtle. If you think about it, no matter how stable Benitez is, he will feel ironic in his heart.

Liverpool took the first shot in the second half. Lampard missed a long shot from the front of the penalty area. Newcastle quickly launched a counterattack. Drogba was knocked down when he was fighting for the top in the frontcourt. Li pushed out of the penalty area, and Stewart kept the ball and shot directly over the crossbar.

A few minutes later, Newcastle made another long pass in the backcourt. When Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Carvalho fought for the top, his brow bone was knocked open. He was bleeding and tried to return to the court after hastily stopped the bleeding, but was rejected by the referee. Mitchell signaled that he had to change clothes before he could play, and Ibrahimovic was dissatisfied with arguing with Mitchell for a few words.

Five minutes later, Ibrahimovic was knocked to the ground by Carvalho when he was fighting for a header. Mitchell showed a yellow card to the Portuguese defender. Newcastle won a direct free kick around 5 meters. Delo Ba Xuhuang shot over the ball, Ibrahimovic followed up and directly slammed the goal, the ball flew under the wall, but Reina made a wonderful save, quickly fell to the ground and saved the ball out of the baseline with both palms!

Immediately afterwards, Nie Fei's corner kick was headed high by Lucio. On such a field, the physical fitness of the players on both sides dropped sharply and they made frequent mistakes, but the players on both sides still gritted their teeth and persisted.

Whoever can persevere will win the game.

(End of this chapter)