Seven Hundred and Eighth Number One Rival

Manchester City beat Lyon 3-1 away.

Chelsea beat Copenhagen 2-0 away.

Manchester United drew 0-0 away at Marseille.

Liverpool beat Barcelona 2-1 at home.

...

After the first round of the knockout round of the Champions League round of 16, all four teams in the Premier League performed satisfactorily.

This immediately shocked the entire European football world.

In the past few years, the Premier League's dominance over European football has been quite amazing, and even broke into three teams in the semi-finals in a row, which made everyone feel the strength of the Premier League team.

Especially this season.

Gao Shen leads Manchester City. So far, it is the only team to maintain an unbeaten record in the five major leagues, and the results are very stable and the lineup is quite large. This makes everyone have no doubt that Manchester City this season will definitely be the champion in the Champions League. a dark horse.

More importantly, Gao Shen has always been good at playing cup games.

With such a huge lineup as the backing, Gao Shen is ambitious and wants to make a difference in the cup.

But being able to beat Lyon 3-1 in the away game and almost advanced to the quarter-finals ahead of schedule, Manchester City's strength is still amazing.

Lyon's coach Puel said at the post-match press conference that his team had tried its best, but in the face of Manchester City's strong strength, Lyon still failed to hold on.

"But in any case, we will do our best to try to reverse the situation away!"

In fact, this statement has been very unfounded.

Skills are not as good as people, which is what Puel wants to express.

In addition to Manchester City, there is another unexpected matchup in the first round of the knockout round, that is, Liverpool beat Barcelona 2-1.

Benitez's teams have always been very good at playing cup games, which is recognized.

But this season's Barcelona has also greatly increased its strength, especially the powerful attacking lineup that Guardiola has created for Barcelona, ​​which has made La Liga and even the entire European football frightened.

But at Anfield,

Benitez's team managed to beat Barcelona, ​​which is undoubtedly a big upset.

More importantly, this game was Liverpool fighting Barcelona head-to-head, and they were not conservative at all.

Yes, Benitez's team still played out.

In terms of ball possession rate, Liverpool is at an absolute disadvantage, but relying on the overall defense, as well as high-position pressing and oppression, it is hard for Barcelona to deflate at Anfield.

Among them, the double defensive midfielders of Biglia and Mascherano, and Gerrard formed the iron triangle in the midfield, which made great contributions.

It can even be said that these three players are the key to Liverpool's victory.

For this victory, the reaction of the British media was even more exciting and exciting than Manchester City's away victory over Lyon.

Because according to the odds of the gaming company, the biggest favorite to win the Champions League this season is Barcelona.

Originally, many people thought that Manchester United, Manchester City and Real Madrid might become Barcelona's opponents. As a result, Real Madrid failed in the group stage.

Now, Manchester United and Manchester City have not yet met Barcelona, ​​but Liverpool seems to be eliminating Barcelona.

...

The media and fans outside were very hyped. After returning to Manchester from Lyon, the Manchester City coaching staff also watched the game for the first time, and conducted a replay and deliberation.

"What Benitez adopted was the tactic we used when Naples played against Barcelona." After watching it for a while, Carlo basically saw the clues.

Gao Shen has always said that against a team with strong pass and control ability like Barcelona, ​​you must not strictly defend.

Relying on defense, in any case, can't stop Barcelona's attack and penetration.

If you take the initiative to attack, there are basically two sets of ideas. One is as Mourinho thinks, which is to focus on the stability of the overall defense, and face Barcelona with a tight defensive formation and aggressive pressing. Put a center with excellent dominance.

When counterattacking, go directly to the center, and then the center will plan the attack in the frontcourt.

Mourinho used Adebayor as a center forward in the first derby of the century at the end of November, but the effect was not satisfactory, so Real Madrid finally lost 0-3 at the Nou Camp.

Well, although it is not as bad as Gao Shen lost in his previous life, it is indeed bad.

Another kind is like Naples, high position oppression, and Barcelona.

This style of play has extremely high requirements on the team's overall formation and teamwork ability. When Gao Shen was in Naples, he really painstakingly trained the team for three years before bringing them out.

What Benitez is using now is the latter.

The reason is also very simple, they lack a center.

Torres has a strong scoring ability, but the biggest advantage of the Spanish center lies in the frontal impact. It is simply unrealistic for him to turn his back.

Later, when Torres moved to Chelsea, one of the reasons why his performance was not satisfactory was that the Chelsea midfielder could not provide him with the opportunity to attack the defense line head-on. He needed to retreat like Drogba to connect and feed back the midfielder. .

Of course, this is at the tactical level. Personally, injuries did have a great impact on Torres.

In fact, whether it is Shevchenko, Torres, or even the central forward who let Anelka play four-three-three, the effect is not very satisfactory. The key is that they are not the type of center forward like Drogba. , couldn't adapt to Chelsea's tactical style of play in which the center feeds back the midfield.

Parallel imports are often born in this way.

"Judging from the first round of the game, Liverpool really played to the limit of their abilities at home, but there are still dangers. Going to the Nou Camp with such a lineup may be more or less ominous." Gao Shen speculated on the trend.

In fact, judging from the first round of the game, Barcelona's advantage is still very obvious, that is, they are not good at seizing opportunities, their luck is a little bit worse, and the rhythm is also disrupted by Liverpool.

But all these unfavorable factors are difficult to reproduce at the Nou Camp.

"Fernando, when the time comes, arrange someone to go to Camp Nou to watch the game and get first-hand detailed information." Gao Shen urged.

Lucas nodded immediately.

In Manchester City's deduction, the number one rival in the Champions League this season is Barcelona.

In fact, judging from the results of the first round, Gao Shen was right in his evaluation of Moratti Jr., that is, Serie A is gradually declining and Bundesliga is taking its place.

The most obvious signal is that, in addition to Naples, AC Milan also lost at home in the first round.

As for Naples' ability to stop the decline, it is also related to the strong team that Gao Shen left for this team.

Recently, Gao Shen has been paying close attention to the movement of the Qatar consortium.

It is said that they are still in contact with Manchester United, but it is not ruled out that they have been secretly contacting Paris Saint-Germain.

If the Qatar consortium enters European football, it will inevitably set off a storm of acquisitions. At that time, Naples will definitely attract attention. If they can take the opportunity to make another fortune, it will undoubtedly be a timely rain for the current Gao Shen.

...

After playing the Champions League in the middle of the week, we ushered in the fifth round of the FA Cup on the weekend.

This time Manchester City's opponent is Aston Villa.

In the fifth round, basically all participating teams were Premier League teams. There were only two English Championship teams, but they broke into one League One team, and that was Brighton, where the local boss was based.

Manchester City hosts Aston Villa at the Etihad.

Gao Shen played in a rotation lineup. Yaya Toure received an assist from Leighton Baines in the opening five minutes and opened the scoring for Manchester City.

Yaya Toure then assisted Van Persie to score a goal.

After changing sides to fight again in the second half, it was Henderson who sealed the victory for Manchester City.

In the end, Manchester City defeated Aston Villa 3-0 at home.

After defeating Aston Villa, Manchester City's draw for the quarter-finals was lucky, and they were drawn to Reading in the English Championship.

But this team advanced after defeating Everton 1-0 in an away game, and their strength should not be careless.

As for Brighton, a local tycoon in the League One, their strength is only in the League One, and they lost to Stoke City 0-3.

...

Back to the Premier League, ushered in the twenty-eighth round of the league.

Gao Shen once again played with a rotation lineup, sitting at home, and defeated the visiting Fulham 2-1.

Then, in the twenty-ninth round of the Premier League, they beat Wigan Athletic 1-0 at home.

In the second round of the knockout round of the Champions League round of 16, Manchester City played at home against Lyon.

In the first round, Manchester City has already won the opponent 3-1 away, and Manchester City, which is basically a sure thing, did not relax at home, but continued to play steadily.

The Lyon team, which has a high probability of being eliminated, played extremely vigorously in the away game. It not only deployed a three-forward tactic, but also arranged a dual-core lineup with Gourcuff and Pjanic in the midfield. There was only one Tula left. Ron is at the end.

Barefoot players are not afraid to wear shoes. Faced with such a desperate opponent, Manchester City fell into a passive position at the beginning of the game, but Gao Shen quickly adjusted the team's tactics, especially focusing on targeted defense, and quickly stabilized their position.

In the 37th minute, Gareth Bale made a low pass from the left, allowing Felipe to break into the penalty area and shoot a cold shot, opening the scoring for Manchester City.

After changing sides to fight again in the second half, Felipe first made a cross from the left and assisted Suarez to score with a header.

A David Silva strike followed, allowing Arjen Robben to seal the win for City with a left-footed drive over the ribs.

In the end, Manchester City beat Lyon 3-0 at home and 6-1 on aggregate, advancing to the quarter-finals.

...

Manchester City won and advanced, and the focus of the game at Camp Nou was not unexpected.

In the first round, they encountered Barcelona, ​​which lost 1-2 in the away game. After returning to Camp Nou, they regrouped and completely suppressed Liverpool at home.

Benitez's team only lasted half of the game, and in the second half, it fell apart.

Messi's brace, Busquets and Harvey's goals allowed Barcelona to score four goals in the second half. In less than 30 minutes, they scored four goals in a row. Liverpool has no power to fight back.

In the end, Benitez's team lost 0-4 away.

The aggregate score was two to five and Liverpool were eliminated.

...

After playing Lyon, Manchester City followed closely in the knockout round of the FA Cup quarter-finals, beating Reading 1-0.

The latter took strict precautions, and insisted on putting up an iron bucket formation, allowing Manchester City to besiege.

Finally, in the second half, Giroud set up Sturridge for the winner.

But in the ensuing Premier League, Manchester City drew Ancelotti's Chelsea 1-1 away.

The current game pressure of the Blues is very high. Ancelotti's team strategically gave up the FA Cup and tried their best to keep the Premier League, but in the end they still failed to win Manchester City at home.

One to one, the two sides shook hands and made peace.

After playing Chelsea, Su Qing, who returned to China after the Spring Festival to go through the resignation procedures, finally returned to the UK.

What followed was the draw for the quarter-finals of the Champions League and news from Leeds United.