i want to be king

Chapter 998 He is serious about football!

Is Mourinho crazy?
This is the day of the game, the focus of major media reports around the world.

No one thought that Mourinho would announce his starting lineup directly one day in advance.

Is he crazy?
Or did he release smoke bombs on purpose?
No one knows why this is, but the major media are all researching the authenticity of this list.

Judging from the list, the authenticity is still quite large, because they are basically the players that Mourinho reused, such as Seydu Keita and Yaya Toure, etc. All the players who should start have started.

But there is also a problem, and that is the lack of left back.

After Abidal started the liver transplant operation, Adriano was Mourinho's reused left back, but he didn't enter the squad for this game. So who is Mourinho planning to arrange to play this position?

Will Puyol comeo?
There is indeed such a possibility, because it is not that Puyol has never played the position of left back.

In this way, it makes sense for Pique and Mascherano to partner as central defenders in the middle.

Barcelona's defense can be said to be strong or strong, but it can be said to be weak or weak. The key depends on what kind of opponent they encounter.

Su Dong scored goals from Barcelona in the past, and now they meet again, everyone is also very curious, can Barcelona's defense freeze Su Dong?

And Mourinho suddenly announced the starting lineup in advance before the game. What is his intention?
…………

…………

Manchester City came to Barcelona a day earlier.

I asked the Spaniard to borrow the training ground before, and went to Camp Nou yesterday for familiarization training.

After working for a while, he rested for the night and woke up the next day. It was such a wave of heavy news, like a thunderstorm, which made everyone unbelievable. Who would have thought that there would be such an operation.

Early in the morning, Begiristain, the technical director who led the team to Barcelona, ​​was called to a meeting by Guardiola and other coaching staff. Su Dong also attended, and the content was nothing more than Mourinho's list.

Unlike outside speculation, Manchester City has real goods.

In fact, the team has been deducing Mourinho's starting lineup for a long time, and they have come up with more than one set.

But I have to say that this starting lineup is really unexpected.

The meeting lasted for an hour before breaking up.

After the meeting was over, Su Dong went directly to the conference room of the hotel, preparing to participate in the team's pre-season preparation meeting.

Before the coaching staff arrived, the players were discussing the roster enthusiastically in the meeting room. They also got news from newspapers, websites and familiar media, and knew various analysis reports.

Seeing Su Dong coming in, everyone immediately surrounded him.

……

"Boss, what is Mourinho planning to do?"

"Su, how authentic is the list? Could it be that Mourinho is cheating us?"

"Without a left-back, it doesn't look real at all."

"I guess, this is Mourinho's smoke bomb. This old boy has learned nothing else, but Ferguson has learned [-]% of it."

"Is it possible that he will really play with this lineup?"

"Didn't you say it just now? Our winger is not a reverse-footed winger. Let Puyol play as a left back. Can he stop Sanchez?"

"Mourinho would never leave us with such an obvious loophole."

"I agree, he must have a conspiracy."

"I have known Mourinho for so many years, this old boy has never been reassured."

The last to speak was Pepe, who was clearly not too impressed with Mourinho.

Everyone expressed their opinions one by one, but in the end they found that they were all talking, and Su Dong had no chance to speak at all.

Suddenly, everyone fell silent again, looking at Su Dong, waiting for him to speak.

"We just studied for an hour, and finally came to the conclusion that..."

Everyone immediately paid attention.

Su Dong grinned happily, "We don't know either."

Everyone was disappointed for a while, is this the answer?
"Actually, except for Mourinho and the Barcelona coaching staff, no one knows whether this list is true or not, and no one stipulates that Mourinho must use this list to arrange the starting lineup, right?"

After everyone thought about it, it was indeed such a truth.

This is where everyone disputes.

"This list is a little bit different from our previous deduction, but overall it is very close. What does he want to do when he releases it at this time? Tell us what he thinks? Or does he want to distract us? Or ask us to guess his mind? Another possibility is that it makes us think too much and mess ourselves up."

Everyone was stunned when they heard it, as if it was true.

This list is okay to bluff the outside media and fans, but for Manchester City, it is really a mystery how useful it is.

Based on this alone, people have to question Mourinho's intentions.

Of course, Manchester City has deduced several starting lists for Barcelona, ​​but none of them is the same as the one announced by Mourinho, so if it is useless, it is not all of them, but the use is very limited.

At this point in the game, it is impossible for Manchester City to specially change their tactics in order to target Barcelona.

If you really want to say that, it may not be worth the candle.

"You mean, we don't look at this list?" Zabaleta asked with concern.

Su Dong shook his head, "Just take a look, there's no need to take it seriously."

Seeing the puzzled eyes of his teammates, Su Dong smiled, and said: "No matter what Mourinho's purpose in publishing this list is, or even what kind of lineup Barcelona plans to adopt, what kind of tactics they adopt, for us, the process and the result are the same. We will use our best method to defeat the opponent."

"We have always been like this. We don't think about the opponent's ideas, tactics and attitudes. We only care about ourselves, because as long as we are good enough and good enough, no team can stop us."

When everyone heard this, they immediately nodded. This is indeed the attitude that Manchester City has been insisting on for the past two seasons, even since Guardiola started coaching.

The only difference is that in the first season of Guardiola's coaching, the results were indeed a bit bad, but after joining Sudong, Manchester City's performance has improved by leaps and bounds, and now it has become a top European team.

"Instead of blindly guessing the opponent's intentions, it is better to concentrate on doing our job well and think about how to play better and better in the game. This is what we should think about now."

Is it useful for Mourinho to announce this list in advance?
Su Dong can't say that there is no such thing at all.

For example Guardiola.

The head coach of Manchester City is famous [Mr. George].

What do you mean?
George, tangled meaning.

Guardiola is too entangled, even to the point where he likes to get into a dead end. He is the kind of person who likes to figure out everything before the game and think through all possibilities.

The more such a person is, the easier it is to make some sudden and unbelievable decisions before a major game, and the easier it is to be influenced and interfered by the opponent's strategy.

Why a meeting early in the morning?
Because Guardiola didn't sleep much last night, he was struggling with this issue.

To a certain extent, this kind of personality has created Guardiola today, but it also makes him easily bewildered.

During the meeting just now, both Su Dong and Begiristan tried to persuade him, but they were really afraid that he would change his team on the spot.

Judging from the current starting lineup of Barcelona, ​​Mourinho is likely to take the defensive.

This is actually not difficult to guess, because of the defeat in the European Super Cup, especially during the game, Mourinho was obviously conservative. With his character, he is likely to take a defensive position and then use a quick counterattack to attack Manchester City.

If he wins, then he can feel proud.

Another point is that he may not be very confident in the team's defense, especially when playing against Manchester City.

With Barcelona on the defensive, Manchester City should stick to their own style of play.

……

Guardiola, accompanied by Begiristan, Torrent and Estiat, walked into the meeting room.

He still had a dignified look, and everyone was used to his expression.

He is serious about football!

Guardiola first discussed with everyone the starting lineup announced by Mourinho, which was similar to what Su Dong said just now. Obviously, in that one-hour meeting, he was persuaded by Su Dong and others and decided to stick to his own style of play.

In the subsequent targeted tactical arrangements, Guardiola did not make new arrangements, but only asked the two sides to pay more attention, and could increase offensive firepower if necessary.

As the player said just now, if Puyol is allowed to play left back, then Sanchez will have an advantage on the right.

As the name suggests, Puyol is a right-footed player. If he plays on the left, he mainly has the advantage of defending against the winger. However, Sanchez is a right-footed player. He can forcefully break through the bottom or penetrate from the bottom line, which makes Puyol very disadvantaged.

"There is also a possibility that Seydu Keita is a left-footed player. Mourinho often uses him to play on the left side of the midfield and has also played as a left back. If he is allowed to play as a left back, the possibility is quite high." Guardiola put forward his own guess.

This guess is also very likely.

Only in this way, Mourinho's midfield arrangement will be more conservative.

Mascherano would be pushed into midfield as a delay, Yaya Toure and Xavi would be freed.

Iniesta, Fabregas and Messi formed the front trident.

The possibility does exist, and it's not small.

Guardiola emphasized that no matter how the opponent adjusts and arranges in the game, Manchester City's tactics will basically remain the same. According to the original plan, the offensive routines are basically what Manchester City is most familiar with.

This is mainly because the team's schedule is too dense, and there is no time for Manchester City to conduct targeted tactical drills in consecutive double matches in a week. They can only adopt the familiar offensive routines on weekdays.

Sometimes, old routines seem clichéd and old-fashioned, but the problem is that it works, and everything works.

Because there are some things that are unique to Manchester City, and opponents cannot guard against them.

Such as Su Dong.

(End of this chapter)