Chapter 151 Refusing to Lose

As the game progressed, Ballack began to follow Zhou Tiancheng in the midfield, and he had only one goal on the defensive end.

Zhou Tiancheng encountered a lot of resistance. Every time he took the ball, he always had to face this iron waist who was about the same size as himself.

To be honest, Ballack is the most difficult defensive player Zhou Tiancheng has encountered. Facing a technical midfielder like Van Bommel, he has the advantage of body tonnage. Facing black and tough players who can fight well, he is confident that he can completely destroy his opponents by relying on technology and rhythm control, even against Khedira. Zhou Tiancheng, a young b2b player who is highly expected by the German media, has a way to deal with it. By running in a wide range, he can get rid of him to gain space. But against Ballack, he really couldn't find any advantage.

In terms of physical condition, he is 1.93 meters tall and weighs 90 kilograms. Ballack is 1.9 meters tall and weighs 88 kilograms. Needless to say, the technical comprehensiveness of both offensive and defensive ends. In terms of experience, Ballack has participated in two World Cups on behalf of the German team, participated in the World Cup final, and also reached the Champions League final with Bayer Leverkusen. Not surprisingly, he will still be the most stable midfielder of the German team in the World Cup in South Africa next year. Iron gate... Zhou Tiancheng is extremely experienced among his peers, but it is obviously unwise to compare his experience with a veteran like Barack.

Zhou Tiancheng tried to get rid of Ballack's defense with sudden stops and quick changes, but no matter how quickly he stopped and turned, Ballack followed him and turned, but at the moment when he finally moved forward, he was able to take the lead and take the lead. Ball destruction.

Of course, Ballack also knew that there was an open field behind him, so he kicked more fiercely, and there were more than one situations where he even swept the ball with the ball.

The home fans immediately booed Ballack. At this time, even if he is the captain of the German team, he will not have any preferential treatment when he returns to the motherland.

This is proud to go to the Schalke Stadium, where there is only one king: Zhou Tiancheng!

Westerman was angry and wanted to go up to argue, but Zhou Tian stood up immediately and continued to run. The audience immediately burst into cheers.

"Zhou Tiancheng is really positive, and his professionalism is absolutely commendable. Focus on the game first on the court, which is what a professional player should do. There is nothing better than scoring a goal." Duan Xuan affirmed.

But the Chinese fans didn't see it that way. Seeing Zhou Tiancheng being knocked down again and again, even the fans of the German team gritted their teeth and growled: Hey, why don't you just let it go, ask the referee for a card!

Even the captain Westerman shook his head and said he was speechless. Zhou Tiancheng was as honest as a rookie. It was difficult for him to negotiate with the referee. The parties did not care about it. Of course he could not say anything.

Zhou Tiancheng didn't care about it. In fact, he didn't want to interrupt the team's continuous offensive rhythm. He thought a little bit, and if he wanted to get rid of Ballack's constant entanglement, he could only make more fuss about running. Compared with Ballack, he is estimated to be only a teenager, and his physical strength is the advantage.

Although at the pre-match preparation meeting, Magath organized everyone to watch a video of Chelsea, from which it was completely impossible to tell that Ballack is a 33-year-old veteran, and his ability to go back and forth is still very strong. But when there is no other way to go, as long as there is a way, you must try it.

A rare scene appeared on the scene: Zhou Tiancheng ran back and forth in the midfield, not only in the middle, but occasionally he would even come to the side, and then give a low and flat ball diagonally to the front line. Zhou Tiancheng received the ball in this position, and he hardly appeared in the game. Magath did not restrict his space on the court, but it is true that he is rarely forced to take the ball freely in this position.

In this way, Schalke 04 faces even greater risks. Zhou Tiancheng's arrival on the side is equivalent to a big missing piece in the middle. The most immediate consequences came in the eighteenth minute.

Ivanovic and Malouda went up at the same time, forcing Zhou Tiancheng to lose his center of gravity. He stretched out his foot and poked it when he fell to the ground, hoping to let Holtby catch the ball. But Ballack chased back in time, grabbed the ball before Holtby, turned around and accelerated the ball directly.

"Barack counterattacked with the ball! Schalke is in great danger." Marcel Leif's tone was serious. In Germany, anyone related to football, whether fans or commentators, knows Ballack's ability.

Holtby naturally understood, but he had tried his best to make up for it. It was futile to throw the center of gravity out and shovel. Ballack had already passed the ball to Lampard before him. Although he uprooted the senior he admired, But failed to stop the opponent's offensive. And the referee Busaka stayed in front of him for a few seconds, took a look before continuing to run up to pay attention to the offense. Holtby knew very well that he was being targeted, and the referee only had the advantage of the offense.

But he doesn't want to think about it so much now. His teammates are actively returning to defense. Zhou Tiancheng lost the ball near the bottom line of the frontcourt just now. Now he has almost passed the middle circle. Chase.

However, it was too late.

Lampard passed the ball to the right midfielder Joe Cole, then ran down the middle. The latter broke along the baseline, attracted the defense, and crossed him. Tescas, with a light buckle, fired directly from the outside, and the ball went straight to the upper right corner without any rotation.

"Neuer - ah... Schalke 04 is behind, this is personal strength. Without Zhou Tiancheng, no one in Schalke can stand against the combination of Ballack and Lampard, so once he is intercepted, he cannot win. Return to the position, and the defense will immediately expose its weakness."

"goooooooal!!! Frank Lampard made Ancelotti's risk pay off immediately in the first twenty minutes, I think they know what to do next, the game with the lead, for these stars It's not hard. But I would say, guard Zhou! Don't give him any space," said Bob Clem.

After taking the lead, Ancelotti ran out of the coaching area in excitement. After calming down, he immediately asked the assistant coach; "See what's going on with Atletico Madrid."

"Carlos, just checked, it's 1:0, Aguero scored."

Ancelotti was a little disappointed. Atletico Madrid was ahead of APOEL. This was a situation he had thought of with a high probability. But he is still a little lucky. If the score there remains unchanged until the midfield, then he only needs to strengthen his defense, and he will be able to qualify with Schalke 04 after this game.

But this situation shattered his luck, and he still had to return to his predetermined tactics.

"We still have to attack."

Chelsea had one win and one draw against Atletico Madrid in the two rounds, and the relationship between victory and defeat is dominant. And the away game was a 4:0 victory, which also earned enough goal difference. Ancelotti thought of continuing to attack purely to expand the advantage of this game and lock the three points.

Leading by one goal in the away game, this score is too unsafe.

After taking the lead, Chelsea pursued a fast attack, relying on Drogba's fulcrum role, and usually completed a shot with three passes. I don't mind giving up possession to the home team, because Lampard and Ballack are firmly in the midfielder position, the defensive system in the midfield is very solid, and the offense is mainly solved by long passes.

Schalke 04 just regained the advantage of possession, but the offense was helpless. Zhou Tiancheng was the only metronome on the field. For Chelsea's defense, it was too easy to focus. And due to the lack of restraint in the midfield, the offense on the wing has also been affected. Even Kuranyi, who made a long pass to find the striker, had little effect. Frontal air defense is Terry's specialty.

At the end of halftime, Schalke was still behind 0:1, and the home fans were not very interested, and they couldn't find any chance to vent their passion.

In the halftime lounge, Magath did not seriously criticize a certain player because of the score lag this time, but rarely reflected on himself in front of everyone: "I know everyone has tried their best, this time I don't blame you, I There was a mistake in the arrangement, resulting in such a result."

These words made everyone pause for a moment, and even raised their heads to look at Magath in front of them, a little surprised: Is this the leader they are familiar with?

At the same time, Magath changed the subject: "But we must win the gap back. Atletico Madrid is already ahead. If we lose, we will only have a three-point gap with the third place, that is, they. You don't want to wait until the last game. Go and fight them? Then we will face the danger of finishing third in the group and playing in the Europa League."

At this moment, no one answered, but the changes in the expressions of the players showed that they realized the seriousness.

Magath looks at everyone's performance, so far, his style is that he talks a lot during training and is very strict, but in the locker room of the game, he is absolutely concise and succinct, relying on the players to adjust themselves.

After Magath finished speaking, the players began to get together to discuss.

"Hey, I suddenly found out that we seem to be really dangerous. I never thought that we would be eliminated before. It seems that I haven't heard of being eliminated by ten points in the Champions League group stage. Is it an illusion?"

"If you really want to play in the Europa League, it's boring. You've seen all the big scenes. It's boring to participate in the second-tier cup." This is Asamoah's point of view.

"Benedict, you are serious. I guess he deliberately scares us. We can win at the Calderon Stadium, but we can't win here? Why should I worry about it?" Neuer was full of confidence.

"Damn APOEL, hurry up and get one!" Matip took out his mobile phone from his bag, and checked the news of another live broadcast.

Zhou Tiancheng was resting, and when he heard Neuer's statement that he didn't take Atletico Madrid seriously, he turned his head and said with a smile: "Manuel, do you still want to wait until the next game to fight them? Deliberately looking for excitement? This game is not over yet, who said they won?"

"Zhou, I know you have self-confidence, but this thing is not a panacea. You have to admit that today Chelsea is indeed more difficult to deal with than when they first played against each other." Left back Bordon said.

"But we're only one goal behind! We only need a draw to get back a goal. Is it difficult? Brothers, we must be confident!" Zhou Tiancheng suddenly raised his voice, "We have an old saying in China, tomorrow Tomorrow, there are so many tomorrows. It means don’t wait until later to do what you should do today. We have a chance to qualify today. Why don’t we fight for it? Those fans outside are here to support us. It’s definitely not to see us lose. Ball. Look, no matter what, we have no reason to take a step back. We were the semi-finals last year. We must go further this year, right? Our goal is-"

"Final!" Everyone said at the same time.

"What about after that? The final is not for losing, is it?"

Everyone froze for a moment, Westerman, as the captain, immediately supported Zhou Tiancheng: "Zhou is right, nothing is impossible. Let's win the championship! Create a big scene!"

"Championship? It feels like a dream, but it's okay to think about it now? Well, count me in, we want to win the championship!" Farfan also joined in.

"champion!"

"champion!"

The locker room effect is like this. The emotions of the players are easily infected with each other. Schalke's locker room soon heard deafening championship slogans.

Zhou Tiancheng stood up and said: "To win the championship, a beautiful group qualifying is a must, so everyone work harder, we have to finish this game first!"

When the starting players were resting in the locker room, Magath came out of the locker room and came to the warm-up area of ​​the court to observe the state of the bench players. When he went back to emphasize the tactics again, he walked to the door and heard "Champion "Slogan, his expression was a little annoyed: These little bastards didn't reflect on their problems, and they were still dreaming during the precious halftime!

He was going to teach everyone a lesson, but he found that it didn't seem to be the case. Everyone's expression on listening to the tactics was obviously more focused than before, and when walking from the locker room to the court, many players jumped up and down, quite excited, as if they were about to go up and do a big job.

Magath had a strange expression on his face. He couldn't help but think of Zhou Tiancheng, because he is the only one who can often stimulate everyone in the locker room. Just now everyone was shouting for the champion...

Now is the time of the Champions League, so naturally it cannot refer to the league championship, so... Magath was taken aback by his own thought, or rather, he was taken aback by Zhou Tiancheng's ambition.

But regardless of whether this is realistic or not, young people do need some special stimulation. Zhou Tiancheng drew a cake for everyone. Although it is still far from realization, everyone at least understands what to do in this game and how to make it happen. "Pie" becomes a reality.

A more direct performance was that at the beginning of the second half, Schalke increased the pressing rhythm, and launched two midfield steals within three minutes to launch a counterattack on the spot.

In the 50th minute, Schalke 04 got a set kick from the left side of the penalty area. Zhou Tiancheng took the penalty and fell quickly, bypassing the wall, and swipe in front of Petr Cech's leaping long arm, straight to the dead corner to equalize the score.

"In! In! Zhou, goooooal!!!" Marcel Leif roared with his mouth open, "This kick allowed Schalke to regain the initiative. Although qualifying is hardly a problem, Schalke proved that They will not let up. They refuse to lose in order to defend the honor of the Bundesliga champions."