Chapter 152 About Winter Signings

Schalke ushered in a good start in the second half. Zhou Tiancheng injected everyone with a shot of stimulant with this goal. I said that I want to win the championship. It was not a whim. Now we have a chance to win!

The most important thing is to keep everyone motivated. At the beginning of the second half, Magath replaced Rakitic, the score returned to a tie, and the midfielder returned to the strongest combination. The hope of Schalke's reversal seems to be one step closer increase step by step.

Ancelotti leaned on the railing of the visiting team's coach bench. After thinking for a moment, he made a counterpoint adjustment on the wing. Wright Phillips came on the field and replaced Malouda, who made little contribution on the offensive end today.

Sean Wright Phillips is only 1.68 meters tall. Small players usually have good dribbling skills, but he did not. His biggest advantage lies in his speed. As one of the fastest players in the Premier League, in live games and FM series games, he is completely configured as a top monster-although in the real world, some Premier League experts once said harshly, if there is no speed, He will be good for nothing. Otherwise, with his background in Manchester City's youth training and his amazing strength in the early days of his debut, he will not only be a substitute for Chelsea.

But under the current circumstances, he played against Schalke 04's left wing Bordon, an old arm and old leg, and he is still quite threatening. At least when Jr. Wright was forced to overtake and start, Boldon really had no good way except to pull people from behind.

However, this kind of defense can only be used once. The referee Busacca is very strict in punishing the opponent's moves today. Bordon has already been warned by a yellow card for the first time, and he dare not reach out easily.

"Marcelo Bordon, it's hard to imagine him turning into the most unstable colander in Schalke's defence."

Magath used the second substitution at the left-back position in time, and Pandel replaced Bordon, a 26-year-old young man in his prime, coupled with Matip's frequent supplementary defenses in place, over time After ten minutes, the impact of Wright Phillips was finally suppressed.

Today Matip can be regarded as a major gain in the large rotation. Due to the stable performance of Hewedes and Westerman before, he did not get many chances to play, but today he showed the audience for the first time that he is not afraid of tigers as a newborn calf, with the primitive African blood in his bones The wild performance of today's game was incisively and vividly. His attack and shovel ignited the cheers of the Schalke stadium again and again, and the audience who had heard of him in the stands began to spread his name by word of mouth.

After the equalizer and withstood Chelsea's attack for a while, Magath played his last card in the 75th minute, Farfan came on but was replaced by Asamoah - Magath put Altintop remained on the field and moved more in the middle of the pitch, adding a strong contact point around Kuranyi.

There is no problem with the idea. When the opponent is strictly defending the middle lane today, it is more direct to seek a breakthrough from the middle lane to pose a threat directly. However, Terry's frontal defense ability is invincible even by Kuranyi at his peak, and Zhou Tiancheng today Activities in the middle are always restricted by Ballack. After Chelsea stabilized the situation, the efficiency of Schalke's high-pressure press dropped significantly. Counting on the success of counter-attacks as frequently as at the beginning of the second half, it is almost impossible for such a mistake to occur twice on a team like Chelsea.

...

At the moment when the final whistle sounded, Schalke could only accept a 1:1 draw, and the home fans began to cheer for the first place in the group, but Zhou Tiancheng just smiled slightly. Didn't even bother to high-five his teammates. Even if Matip came to pull him, he only said one sentence: "It's almost done, Joel. It's just a draw, and we didn't win, so why get excited, don't forget our goal."

"Zhou, you are still so boring." Matip shrugged and ignored Zhou Tiancheng.

When all the reporters saw this scene, they immediately became interested.

Zhou Tiancheng did not join his teammates in celebrating,

What's happening here?

In the mixed interview area, many reporters surrounded Zhou Tiancheng and asked him if he was dissatisfied with the home draw.

Unexpectedly, Zhou Tiancheng denied it: "It should be more accurate to say that there are some regrets, but this point can ensure the qualifying. In the end, the football game only depends on the result, so there is nothing dissatisfied."

This answer made many reporters more curious: "But you don't seem to think so, you didn't celebrate with your teammates."

Zhou Tiancheng smiled: "You should look at us with a higher standard. We are no longer the team that aimed to qualify for the group. Those top European giants, do they celebrate the group qualifying as a championship? My teammates and I We have a consensus that we have big goals this year, bigger goals than last year's Final Four."

"What is it? A champion?"

"Champions? How could they? They can beat Real Madrid?" The journalists from Spain in the crowd didn't believe it at all, and they didn't even shy away from letting Zhou Tiancheng hear it, so they yelled out loudly. There was contempt in his eyes.

Boy, do you want to win the championship? Hahaha!

"Secret. It's not time to reveal it yet." Zhou Tiancheng just laughed it off, avoiding putting himself on the cusp of the storm.

But the Chinese reporter seemed to have read Zhou Tiancheng's thinking. Since he mentioned a bigger goal than last year, it must be the final. So after entering the finals, who doesn't want to win the championship? With Zhou Tiancheng's desire to win, can he accept the logic of "failure is the mother of success" and wait for the next season to come back?

So on domestic websites, there were many headlines such as "Zhou Tiancheng hints that Schalke will hit the Champions League", "Aspire to Europe: Schalke's season goals revealed". Although fans know that China's sports media has always been unreliable, they are still willing to click in and watch it as a pastime. For nothing else, no one is unconvinced by the ability of the person who said this. This is not the arrogance and ignorance of a fool, but the ambition of a powerful person.

So the suspension of Zhou Tiancheng facing Werder Bremen in the next league is a good thing in the eyes of the fans. The national team and club competitions are in a row, and it is not easy for him to get some rest time.

But Magath was about to worry. In terms of the team's current configuration, Zhou Tiancheng is absolutely indispensable. With him around, Magath has the confidence to fight against any opponent, because Zhou Tiancheng's control is absolutely impeccable, but without him, even against an upstream team in the Bundesliga like Werder Bremen, Magath will have the confidence to fight hard. Garter has to base himself on defense and counterattack.

Because Zhou Tiancheng won't be able to play in the next match anyway, Magath simply let him rest. He knew that Zhou Tiancheng's club and the national team had never had much rest. Magath rarely showed a benevolent side: " Zhou, you should make some adjustments, I hope the team can successfully fight for the championship in the second half, you know, Zhou."

Zhou Tiancheng nodded. After playing in the Bundesliga for a season, he certainly knew the law that 70% of the half-time champions would win the league championship. In fact, he doesn't really believe in the so-called laws, but this is the boss's kindness. Besides, although the half-time championship can't prove any problems, it can at least boost the confidence of the whole team. So Zhou Tiancheng also accepted the suggestion of taking a complete rest for the next few days. Once the suspension period is over, he will come back to fight the remaining two games with the whole team.

In the training base, Magath began to concentrate on rehearsing the lineup without Zhou Tiancheng. Most importantly, he put more emphasis on running. Zhou Tiancheng is not only the core of the organization, but also a major player in running output. He is gone. Magath requires everyone to run an extra kilometer on the field to maintain the same intensity of the game.

Anyway, keep running! Run like hell!

Everyone has been tossed enough, but there is still a little distance from Magath's expectations.

But Magath knew it was an inevitable problem. Training is not easy to solve. The most fundamental problem is that the overall strength is still too thin.

Thinking of this, he felt that he had to talk to Helter, and the team had to do something in the upcoming winter window.

Magath took out a large piece of paper and handed it to Helt, with densely packed names all over it.

"Felix, is this?"

"Horst, we have to make some moves during the winter transfer period. The current strength of the team still needs to be improved, so this is a player I am optimistic about. I hope the club can contact them."

"Felix, are you sure?" Herter's eyes widened, "Dear Felix, I have to remind you that we are not Bayern Munich, but we don't have the money to buy so many players, more than ten, too many. "

Magath narrowed his eyes slightly behind the mirror frame: "Of course I know this. I never regarded the team as Bayern Munich. If you look carefully at these people, they are not considered to be the current popular stars. I just want you to get in touch with them first." Contact, in fact, there are many people in this list who are candidates. But the few people I marked are the players I need very much, you must try your best to talk about it.”

"Felix, we used to promote young players from the youth academy. This is our tradition. Take a look at Zhou..." Helter glanced at the list, and he felt that several of them were more difficult , so he wanted to persuade Magath to let go.

"Stop talking about the past, Horst!" Magath interrupted him suddenly: "In the past, Schalke just wanted to stand in the ranks of the strong teams and qualify for the Champions League every season. But now we want to defend the title! This is not to emphasize the miners The spirit is not something that can be solved by promoting a few young players. They lack experience. I now need mature players with game experience to add in. This needs money. According to my standards, the current strength of the team is not enough , At least after the suspension for a week, there is no guarantee that we can win Bremen in the next game. Do you still think this is not a problem? I remember that when I invited me, I promised well. The club will fully cooperate with me in matters of the team."

...

As the winter window approached, all the teams began to make tentative offers, especially the giants, who began to compete for top monsters around the world.

The transfer focus of the Bundesliga has always been on Bayern, but in this transfer window, the first major deal disclosed was related to Schalke 04.

This surprised many media and experts. Schalke has never been the focus of the transfer market before. As the Bundesliga champions, they are even low-key and scary, especially when it comes to buying players. Most of the news related to Schalke It's all related to the departure of a certain star from the team.

But Schalke 04, who has changed their coach this season, seems to understand the way of life.

The first transfer transaction was related to them, and the target was a well-known star.

It was first revealed that Schalke's sports director Helter had a secret meeting with Huntelaar's agent Osterwell in a coffee shop in Milan, and the Dutch international received an olive branch from the Bundesliga champions. To put it bluntly, as long as the winter window opens, it is almost certain that he will go to the Bundesliga!

In fact, this is also the reason why Magath chose Huntelaar as the first choice for striker signings. Although he is already the champion of the Bundesliga and may win the championship for the second time this season, before winning the Champions League, he will definitely not be able to attract top names such as Eto'o and Ibrahimovic. Magath can only look at Focus on those stars who have a certain reputation and have proven themselves in big competitions, but are not able to play in the first-tier giants, and are depressed... Huntelaar obviously belongs to this type. Last year, he was selected into the squad for the 2008 European Cup of the Dutch national team. He represented the national team in nine appearances and scored seven goals throughout the year, with extremely high efficiency. But the club career has not been smooth, and he can only sit on the bench in Real Madrid and AC Milan. It is definitely said that he left because he was obviously hopeless as the main force in Leonardo's 4-3-3 system. He had the nickname "Roud van Nistelrooy II", which shows that he is the same as his predecessor Ruud van Nistelrooy. No. 9 center forward, but in Milan, it is obviously too difficult for him to compete with Inzaghi and Borriello for the main center position.

But just two days after the news broke, his agent Osterwell stood up and said: "I can now say with certainty that he is a member of Milan at this moment. As for some clubs who are interested in him." Reports are just rumours. Rule out the possibility of him leaving in January? I can't give an answer, but at the moment, I repeat, I have no contact with other clubs."

According to the photos published that day, the person sitting in Osterville was undoubtedly Helt, but now one party categorically denies it, which only shows that the negotiation did not reach an agreement. With Huntelaar's current low data contribution rate, the possibility of deliberate speculation and seeking to sell for a price is very low, and Schalke is not a completely unknown club. With Huntelaar's current state, it really cannot be regarded as Schalke 04 climbed high.

"Felix, I have to tell you the bad news. Huntelaar probably won't be able to get it in a short time. His agent is asking for an annual salary of five million euros, and you know it's impossible. I'm sure that one sits for half a season A down-and-out star on the bench, his contribution rate will not be the same as that of Zhou."

Zhou Tiancheng's current annual salary is only 5 million euros, but he knows what level of data contribution he gave.

"It doesn't matter. I thought it would not go so smoothly. Let's start the backup, Horst. I hope that there will be fresh blood in the winter training. I have enough patience with Kuranyi."

Helter smiled: "It's more difficult for you to choose, Ruud van Nistelrooy! Do you know how many teams from the five major leagues are scrambling for players from Real Madrid every year? How much competition we will face... I really hope to hear from you You're making fun of me, just talking casually."

"I'm sorry, it's true, I need a tower shooter who can score, Horst, don't make the office too comfortable, challenge something difficult, occasionally you will feel accomplished, no huh?" Magath chuckled.