After three days of adaptive training, on November 19, the first leg of the 2017 AFC Champions League final finally started at the Prince Fahd Stadium, the home stadium of Riyadh Crescent.
Playing in the AFC Champions League final is nothing unusual for the players of the Longteng team.
The Longteng players who are still on the team, including Lu Zhihui, Ma Yongli, Tao Wentao and Nie Jiang, were all the main players in the team that won the championship.
As for the other main players, none of them have experienced hundreds of battles in the AFC Champions League.
As for Chinese fans and media, it is even less of a problem. In recent years, Chinese Super League teams have repeatedly reached the finals and won the championship. The initial hype and crazy information bombing after the Chinese Super League clubs entered the AFC Champions League finals have disappeared.
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Most of them are calm data comparisons and quick team information before the game, and all kinds of off-field news have basically disappeared.
Zhang Sheng's requirements for the team are very clear: away games in West Asia are not easy to play, especially in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the away games should be stable and the home games should be strong again.
Once the strategic goal is set, the entire coaching staff begins to guide and arrange tactics with this as the core.
In response to the impact of the defensive midfielder's yellow card suspension, the more offensive 4-3-3 formation was abandoned, and another team's usual pressing 4-4-2 was adopted. The defensive midfielder was selected.
Instead of deploying Zeng Wenming, who is more creative and technically capable, Qu Wenming, who is more resolute in defense and better at doing dirty work, was hired.
Ma Yongli's performance on the defensive line was outstanding. In the three games after his return from injury, he wore the captain's armband and commanded the defense in an orderly manner, which fully reflected his position as the team's deputy. He will continue to start in this game to replace the injured
The position of captain Lu Zhihui.
In other positions, the Longteng team did not make any adjustments, and all three foreign players came on the field; Shen Jun and Huang He's left and right full-backs, one mainly defends and the other mainly attacks, which is considered the traditional routine of the Longteng team; Li Ming and Ma Yongli, who have played confidently this season, partnered with Zhongli
Defender; Tao Wentao in the midfield is responsible for organizing and linking up; Nie Jiang on the striker is the center of attention.
After the opening, Riyadh Crescent was very energetic. After getting the right to kick off, they took a few shots to get their formation in position. At the same time, after observing the Longteng team's position, the team's defensive midfielder Mi
Lacey made a long pass directly into the Longteng team's penalty area.
Omar Khribin judged the right spot of the pass before Ma Yongli and stopped. However, Ma Yongli is also very experienced. He knows this kind of long-distance pass. The speed of the football ball is slow and the height is high. He wants to
When heading towards the goal, you must hit the right position, take off high enough, and stay in the air for a long time. As long as there is a slight interference, the opponent will definitely miss the header or miss it directly.
Sure enough, after Ma Yongli approached Omar Khribin, he lightly fought with the opponent in the air. The football flew past Omar Khribin's leader and went directly out of the baseline. The latter did not touch the ball at all.
.Not a single corner kick was given to Riyadh Crescent.
This is the use of experienced players on the court. The opponent can make a surprise attack to gain an advantage, but experienced players can resolve the crisis in the simplest and least labor-intensive way.
Of course, the players themselves must also have the basic strength to solve this crisis.
The ball changed hands, and the Longteng team began to plan their own offense.
Compared with Riyadh Crescent's offensive method of long-distance passes to the penalty area, the Longteng team relied on ground advancement starting from the goalkeeper.
"It's been a long time since I've seen the Longteng team's layer-by-layer offensive starting from the last defensive position." Dong Lu, who was responsible for commentating the game, said.
Dong Lu's old partner Li Xin gave the answer: "This all depends on Ma Yongli. Among the Longteng team's defenders, Ma Yongli is the best in terms of passing skills. With him on the back line,
, which can ensure a high success rate for the ball from the backcourt, and is more organized and threatening."
"Ma Yongli's comeback has been of great help to the Longteng team's overall tactics." Dong Lu also affirmed.
As a player who had been banned for falsely reporting his age, Ma Yongli was a blessing in disguise. During the suspension period, he was scouted by the Longteng team and introduced him to the team. Because he was suspended and had no competition duties, he was recruited by the Longteng team for more than a year.
The team's youth training coach, and even Zhang Sheng, directly intervened and worked on the technical details of the ball, with passing skills being the key point.
It can be said that among the existing central defenders, except Lu Yangyang - after all, he is not the main force, Ma Yongli's footwork is the most trusted by Zhang Sheng, even though Ma Yongli has weak header ability and not top-notch confrontation ability.
Weakness, once he is healthy and clear, he will definitely have a place in the starting position of central defender.
The Longteng team, which was determined to control the tempo in the away game, was not too eager to push the ball into the Riyadh Crescent penalty area under the command of Zhang Sheng.
The visiting team played solidly, but Riyadh Crescent did not want this.
In a two-leg home and away game like the AFC Champions League, if we don’t get some results quickly at home, we will not only lose the rare advantage of the home court, but it will also have a huge impact on our mentality in the second game.
The head coach of Riyadh Crescent, Ramon Dias, is also an experienced head coach. The 57-year-old has the experience of leading the team to win the Copa Libertadores and the South American Super Cup, and has worked with many Chinese Super League teams.
There have been scandals in the team.
In terms of pre-match arrangements, Ramon Diaz's strategic goal is very clear - to score goals as soon as possible in home games, and to score more goals more likely.
So when the Longteng team wanted to control the rhythm, Riyadh Crescent immediately used fierce must-grabs and fouls to increase the rhythm of the game, and at the same time, Yi Neng got the ball.
Asian clubs said they wanted to use a high press to suppress the Dragons, and all the Chinese Super League teams laughed.
Ever since the Dragons began to use oppressive tactics in the past two seasons, due to the Dragons' outstanding performance in the past few years, countless teams in the entire Chinese Super League have followed suit.
Even though the Longteng team has been generous in sending high-level players to various clubs in recent years, which has greatly improved the strength of the Chinese Super League teams, no team in the Chinese Super League has been able to use high pressure to defeat the Longteng team.
Deflated.
Beijing Guoan, which relied on high pressure to defeat Guangzhou Evergrande 2:0 like Smit, couldn't do it; Shanghai SIPG, which had the top foreign aid in the Chinese Super League, couldn't do it; and even Guangzhou Evergrande, which had the strongest overall strength, couldn't do it.
Speaking of the top teams in the Saudi Super League, the strength is not weak. Whether it is Riyadh Crescent, Riyadh Victory, or Al Ahli, they are all regulars in the knockout stages of the AFC Champions League, but the overall strength of the Saudi Super League is not strong.
Not to mention compared to the Chinese Super League in this time and space.
The Riyadh Crescent players, who did not have much unified command, simply used foul tactics after running around blindly like headless flies for a long time and failing to grab the ball.
Ramon Diaz obviously still has research on the Longteng team. He also knows that the core of the Longteng team's midfield is Qi Ming, who is suspended and unable to play in this game. So Qu Wenming, who came on the bench to replace Qi Ming, must not be as strong as the former.
It is a wise choice to focus on taking care of substitute players.
In the fifth minute of the first half, Riyadh Crescent's Eduardo saw Qu Wenming receiving a pass from Shen Jun, and he directly moved his body to carry Qu Wenming.
Qu Wenming is only over 1.75 meters tall and does not look like a muscular player. He thinks that he is 1.77 meters tall and thinks that Brazilian players have better physiques than East Asian players and will definitely win in a confrontation. The opponent will definitely win.
Damn, Eduardo was very unscrupulous in his robbery.
However, he obviously underestimated Qu Wenming's ability to withstand pressure. The latter did not panic at all when facing the fierce attack, but quickly passed the ball to Fernando who came to meet from the left.
Then, Eduardo couldn't hold back his body and knocked down Qu Wenming who had already passed the ball.
The referee was just about to call Eduardo a foul when a scream from another area caught his attention. When he turned his head, he saw that Fernando, who had just received the ball on the left sideline, had been brought down by a Riyadh Crescent player.
Fernando fell to the ground, clutching his legs with a painful expression on his face.
Zhang Sheng, who happened to be standing on the sidelines not far from the sideline, raised his hands excitedly and waved to complain to the referee: "Foul, foul, red card!"
"Director Zhang Sheng is very excited." Li Xin said in a good tone with a smile. Obviously, as can be seen in the broadcast footage just now, although Fernando was violated, it was not serious. He was lying on the ground more because he wanted to complain to the referee.
Foul behavior committed by the opponent.
Seeing this situation, the referee first warned Zhang Sheng: "Go back to your position." Then he showed a yellow card to the player who committed the foul, Riyadh Crescent midfielder Otaif.
After all, such continuous fouls and continuous knocking down of opposing players can easily arouse the anger of both parties on the court. If the referee does not give certain punishment measures in time, the subsequent actions of both parties will become more and more serious.
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Many referees did not express their attitude decisively and wanted to let it go, which resulted in more and more vicious fouls in subsequent games. In order to prevent serious accidents, the referee continued to give red and yellow cards, and the rhythm of the game became fragmented.
In the end, everyone will see the public opinion after many Chinese Super League games in reality - after the game, no matter which team is dissatisfied with the penalty, they all catch the referee and complain.
It should be said that the AFC arranged for the Omani referee Kafu to officiate in the AFC Champions League final, which reflects the importance they attach to the game.
Although this referee is from West Asia and the home game is also in West Asia, he is an old acquaintance and old friend of the Chinese team. He has refereed 5 AFC Champions League games involving Chinese Super League teams, and the Chinese Super League teams have 3 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss.
Loss. The penalties in the game did not have the common bad habit of West Asian referees specifically targeting Chinese teams.
Zhang Sheng, who was successful, immediately returned to his position with a calm look on his face, because the plan worked.
As early as before the game, the coaching team of the Dragons fully studied all the information about all possible starting players of Riyadh Crescent.
Among them, Otaev is a key player that the Longteng coaching staff pays attention to.
It’s not about how strong this player is, but this midfielder is the one who does the dirty work in the Riyadh Crescent team and is prone to receiving cards.
In the first round of the AFC Champions League semi-finals not long ago, Otaev tackled an opponent's player twice in less than a minute in the second half, received two yellow cards, successfully synthesized a ruby card, and was ejected by the referee. If not
Teammate forward Omar Khribin performed well and scored a hat trick. The outcome of the game was really hard to say.
At the same time, past data also shows that Otaif is the person with the most cards in the Riyadh Crescent team and the person with the most cards per game.
Finding the right opportunity to let Otaev take the card is one of the many things that the Longteng coaching staff listed in their pre-game preparations to strive for reality in the game.
Just now, Zhang Sheng saw Otaev rushing over to defend Fernando with a fierce look on his face, and he immediately made a plan to get Otaev to get a card, which was to put pressure on the referee from the sidelines.
Sure enough, players like Otaev are obviously the focus of the referees - experienced referees also understand such things as shooting the first bird and killing the chicken to scare the monkey, and when preparing before the game, they should
How to control the game and give power to players who like to cause trouble is to prepare conventional methods.
It can be said that the Longteng coaching staff collected information before the game, made targeted plans from multiple perspectives including tactics, players, and referees, and then made full use of the real-time conditions on the field to cleverly make the opponent players "very reasonable"
Got a yellow card.
The defensive midfielder received a yellow card early, which is a huge blow to a team that hopes to score more goals through offense.
Investing a lot of resources in the offense will inevitably lead to big holes in the defense, so the defensive midfielder is extremely important in the game. Whether or not he has cards may affect whether the team loses the ball - facing the opponent's counterattack at critical moments
, does a defensive midfielder with a yellow card commit a foul or not?
Looking at the unhappy expression on Ramon Diaz's face on the sidelines, you can see the impact of this yellow card on his tactical arrangements.
Now that midfielder Otaev has received a card, Ramon Diaz has to take remedial measures accordingly, which is to make the players in the frontcourt more active and more courageous in counterattacking. Of course, this will inevitably make the players consume more
physical fitness and risk of injury.
The Longteng team, which received a free kick from the midfield wing, did not invest many offensive players. DePaul's pass was pushed out of the penalty area by the opponent's center back Jahfali, destroying the Longteng team's set-piece attack. Riyadh
Crescent won the ball again.
Once they got the ball, Riyadh Crescent once again invested heavily in the offense, and the ball player in the backcourt was midfielder Milesi.
This time Milesi did not directly pass the ball into the Dragons penalty area, otherwise Riyadh Crescent's offensive resources of up to 7 people who had already crossed the half court would have been in vain.
Milesi passed the ball to the dominant side of their positional tactics - the right wing.
On the right wing of Riyadh Crescent, they have the midfield engine of the Saudi national team like Faraj, whose foot skills have always been recognized as the best in Saudi Arabia.
After Farage received Milesi's pass, he did show his superb foot skills. The Dragons' left winger Fernando was not a very good defensive player. During Farage's skillful breakthrough with the ball,
Fernando was forced to retreat step by step.
In just a few seconds, Faraj held the ball and entered the 30-meter defensive area of the Longteng team, and Riyadh Crescent's overall offensive formation followed suit.
