Although the Chinese team defeated the Oman Olympic team with a score of 4:0 in the opening game, fully demonstrating their strong offensive firepower.
But Trident ended up with a goalless draw in the second group match.
They played 0:0 with the Uzbekistan Olympic team, the strongest team in this group.
The best performance of the Chinese Olympic team in this game was the defense.
The Olympic team's defense, which had been criticized for conceding goals in each of the three warm-up matches in October last year, withstood the fierce attack of the Uzbekistan Olympic team in this game.
Although this is related to the fact that the Chinese Olympic team’s tactical focus in this game is defense, it is undeniable that the central defender combination of Wang Guangwei and Liu Yan, coupled with the addition of goalkeeper Lin Zhiyuan, has indeed improved the hard strength of this defense line.
A lot.
Especially Lin Zhiyuan.
In the last game, he didn't have much room to play, and this game almost became the protagonist.
With his help, the Chinese Olympic team and the Uzbekistan Olympic team shook hands and made peace.
After the two group matches, the Chinese team and Uzbekistan both had one win and one draw, accumulating four points. The Chinese team currently ranked first in the group with a four-goal goal difference advantage.
There are a total of 16 participating teams in the U23 Asian Cup, divided into four groups. The top two teams in each group advance to the knockout rounds to determine the champion, second and third place. The U23 Asian Cup is held every two years, but only in the Olympic year.
That session was considered the Olympic qualifying tournament, and the top three qualified to participate in the Olympic football competition.
Previously, regardless of whether it was an Olympic qualifier or not, apart from the first U23 Asian Cup, the Chinese team had never qualified for the group stage in this event.
In fact, if it were not linked to the Olympic qualifiers, the most practical goal before the Chinese Olympic team should be to qualify from the U23 Asian Cup group stage first.
Although they failed to defeat Uzbekistan in the second round, public opinion is still very supportive and optimistic about this Olympic team.
After all, four points already gave them an advantage in qualifying for the group.
In the next final group match, as long as they get points from Qatar, they can advance to the knockout rounds - whether they get one point or three points, if they don't lose, they will definitely qualify.
To put it bluntly, it means qualifying after a tie...
However, the media seemed to think this statement was too unlucky, so when promoting it, they said, "As long as the Chinese team gets points in the next group match, they will advance."
Saying this, it really makes people feel more at ease.
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After two rounds of group matches, the current situation in Group A is as follows:
The Chinese team has one win and one draw, with four points and four goal differences ranking first.
Uzbekistan has one win and one draw, with four points and a goal difference of one, ranking second.
Qatar has one win and one loss, with three points and zero goal difference, ranking third.
Oman has lost two games, accumulated zero points, and ranked fourth with a goal difference of five.
In the last round of the group stage, Uzbekistan played Oman. There is no suspense in this game. Judging from the strength and performance of both sides, Uzbekistan has a very high winning rate. The only suspense may be just to win a few goals.
Another group match is the match between the Chinese team and Qatar.
Whether it is this time and space or the time and space where Hu Lai came, Qatar can be regarded as one of the sufferers of Chinese football in recent years - of course, Chinese football has always had many sufferers, so it is not a strange thing.
This is why Chinese football started a very determined reform in 2015. If they don’t change, judging from the performance of Vietnam and Thailand’s youth training, they will soon be honored as the “new masters of Chinese football”.
The last feud between Chinese football and Qatar at the Olympic level was the 2016 Olympic qualifiers. At that time, the Chinese team qualified from the group stage in the U23 Asian Cup and Olympic qualifiers, but met Qatar.
Then lost.
Lost the qualification to participate in the Olympic Games.
The reason why that failure left a deep impression on Chinese fans is that before this qualifier, Chinese football had just undergone a thorough reform, and everyone had high hopes for this reform. As a result, the Olympic qualifiers the next year
The Chinese Olympic team failed in the U23 Asian Cup...
Although football is not a sport that will see immediate results after reform, in such a symbolic qualifying match, the Chinese team was defeated by the Qatar Olympic team and lost its qualification for the Olympics. It was still a huge blow to everyone at the time.
Confidence in Chinese football reform.
From then until now, the Olympic team has never faced Qatar again - including in warm-up matches.
This sounds like a coincidence, but after careful interpretation, it becomes:
"Chinese football was heartbroken by Qatar. Naturally, it had to hide after being beaten again and again, so it deliberately did not arrange a warm-up match with Qatar. This is essentially a cowardly act. They are so cowardly and heartless from top to bottom.
, how can Chinese football be so good?"
It's like Chinese football is scared out of its wits by Qatar.
The U23 Asian Cup and Olympic Qualifiers held in our own country this time just let those who hold this view take a look at whether Chinese football is really scared out of their wits by Qatar...
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"Fuck, this is the guy who is bragging about our match against Qatar!"
In the U23 Asian Cup WeChat group of the Chinese Olympic team, Wang Zijian sent a news link.
You don’t need to click on it just to read the title: “The referee of the mid-card battle has been confirmed, and Iranian referee Alireza Farhani will officiate this focus battle...”
"Who is this person?" Hu Lai asked in the group.
"Hu Lai, don't pretend!" Wang Zijian quickly replied.
"I really don't know who this person is and what happened to him?" Hu Lai was confused.
"I'm going, right Hu Lai? Have you forgotten? He was the one who blew the whistle on our East Asian Cup match against South Korea..."
Hu Lai, who was holding the mobile phone, widened his eyes and suddenly realized: "Oh oh oh, it's him!"
In the East Asian Cup match against the South Korean team, Hu Lai could still feel the referee's bias in refereeing the game. His actions towards the South Korean team's players were more tolerant than those of the Chinese team's players.
If Sun Haomin's tackle against Hu Lai wasn't so obvious, and Hu Lai's reaction had such a visual impact that it was impossible to ignore it, I'm afraid Sun Haomin would still be on the court until the end of the game.
"An Iranian referee blew the whistle on our match against Qatar. The AFC can do that..." someone complained in the group.
"Ahem, don't say that. In our game against Oman, the referee is still Japanese, an East Asian referee. Why doesn't anyone say that East Asian referees help East Asian teams?"
"Can it be the same? It's not like we don't know the virtues of West Asian football. West Asians are the best at teaming up. On the other hand, we in East Asia are fighting among ourselves and it's impossible to unite. I dare say that if a Korean referee were to call our game, who knows what?
What does it look like..."
"Can't we simply classify relatives based on geographical relationships? It seems that various factions in West Asia also dislike each other, and there is even a blood feud... Can they unite so easily?"
"I don't know the reason behind this, but I know that disgusting things like this have been done in West Asian football before!"
Seeing that everyone was arguing, the team captain Guo Junfu quickly put out the fire in the group: "Okay, okay, no matter who the referee is, the game still depends on us. What does football politics have to do with us?
?If you have feelings for the referee, don’t bring them into the game!”
Hu Lai started: "Roger that!"
Chen Xingyi followed closely: "Roger it!"
Then Wang Zijian, who initiated the topic in the first place, immediately replied: "Copy that!"
Below is the "received" refresh screen for everyone to maintain formation.
Guo Junfu finally breathed a sigh of relief when he saw this scene in front of his mobile phone.
Before the final round of the group stage, everyone's mood seemed to be a little different.
The expectation of qualifying and the anxiety of the unknown mixed together, making the atmosphere inside the team strange.
Therefore, a piece of refereeing news can cause controversy in the group. In the past, who would care about who the referee is in this game?
Anyway, no matter who it is, they can play normally.
Putting these factors together, Guo Junfu felt that his teammates had a somewhat desperate mentality.
As the captain, he needs to help the head coach maintain the atmosphere within the team, which is also one of his jobs.
Today, he felt that his intervention was quite timely, and he did not wait until everyone was competing for hundreds of chat records before he came forward, then everyone might not be able to hold it back.
This is thanks to him being an "observer" who likes to dive into the group and peek at the screen when nothing happens, so he can detect bad signs in time.