Chapter 815

After receiving the award from Zurich, Yang Yang and others returned to Madrid without stopping.

The team resumed training after a week of Christmas holidays, and will usher in the sixteenth round of La Liga on the evening of January 3, which is obviously a big challenge.

It was as if the Chinese New Year had just passed and the big holiday was over, and when you started to work again, you would inevitably find yourself a little bit out of shape. Even on the first day of the team's restart of training, everyone went to the team doctor Carlos Dia. Sri Lanka reported that when the body was tested, many people were overweight.

This is not a big deal at all, and everyone is used to it.

During the Spring Festival, when a professional player gains three pounds, it is difficult to maintain the kind of self-discipline during the league as long as professional players are on vacation. Coupled with the eating and partying during the festival, gaining weight is also a natural thing.

Not to mention others, even Yang Yang's data is somewhat unsatisfactory.

But it's not because of his lack of self-discipline, but because he's been on the go these past few days, either at club events or sponsorship events, and traveling long distances to Dubai and Zurich, which has made his training and diet very difficult. Irregularity will naturally affect his body.

"It's okay, in comparison, you're already pretty good." Carlos Dias comforted with a smile.

"Carlos is right, adjust slowly." Yesterdam also comforted.

But Yang Yang still sighed deeply, he was somewhat helpless.

He is now the number one player in the team, and he attracts attention wherever he goes. He is also the face of the team. Naturally, there are many things outside the stadium. For example, this trip to Dubai was made by the official Real Madrid.

If not, he would rather stay at home and live comfortably.

The coaching staff is obviously mentally prepared for the situation of the players. Before the holiday, they also made a recipe for each person, but God knows how many people can strictly abide by it?

After Benitez received the player's physical examination report submitted by the medical team, his face became ugly, and he slammed a few words, but he was not too harsh. The subsequent training was mainly adjusted, and there was no Measure blindly.

However, in the afternoon of the same day, the team conducted a tactical training session, the content of which was defensive drills.

...

Benitez's tactical philosophy comes down to two words, balance.

The balance of offense and defense, the balance of wing and middle, the balance of fast and slow.

As a Spaniard, he played in Real Madrid, but he didn't play very well. After retiring, he became a youth coach at Real Madrid, but the most profound influence on him was Italian football, especially the one coached by Sacchi. That AC Milan.

In a compact defensive formation, the distance between the center forward and the last defender should never exceed 25 meters.

The team moves as a compact unit up and down the court, shifting from side to side.

This style of play is somewhat similar to the feeling of the Roman phalanx, and it is this tactical concept that creates a comprehensive team like Liverpool that can attack and retreat.

Benitez's philosophy is to press and press through a compact overall formation, without giving the opponent any breathing space.

The benefits of this are very obvious. It can be said that Liverpool's glory in the past few years is based on such a set of tactics, and Real Madrid also adopted this style of play when they beat Barcelona 5-0 away.

But there is a problem, that is, this style of play puts a lot of emphasis on the team's tactical execution and player availability.

When I was at Liverpool, the British media once criticized Benitez's defense, believing that this kind of area-to-man defense system, which combines area defense and man-to-man, has serious problems, whether it is in set-piece defense. , or when defending the opponent's offense, it is easy to expose problems.

For this reason, the British media even discussed and criticized Benitez's zone-marking defense system at length. Vicchi hit consecutive headers, which made Benitez almost a sinner in everyone's mouth after the game.

...

"Liverpool have four defenders and their names are: Everyone, Some, Nobody and Anyone."

"When Ivanovic needs to be marked, everyone believes that someone will do it."

"Anyone can do it well, but in the end no one does it. When no one does it, everyone gets mad because it's everyone's job. Everyone thinks someone will do it. , but no one realized that no one was actually going to do it.”

"The result is that everyone is berating someone because no one has done what anyone could have done right from the start."

"So, Liverpool went home."

...

This is a joke that the media used to make fun of Liverpool at the time.

It's a joke, but it very clearly dissects the so-called zone-marking problem, it's too complicated.

However, in the face of ridicule, irony and sarcasm from the outside world, Benitez has repeatedly emphasized one thing, that is, Liverpool's zone-marking defense is the most advanced defensive concept. There are problems, but there is no need to criticize this system. play.

Zone defense can lead to grey areas on the court because each player has a limited area of ​​coverage; man-to-man can eliminate grey areas, but the frequent movement of opponents can cause more people to be missed by defenders.

And the combination of man-to-man in regional defense is a defensive concept that is gradually being used by more and more teams. In this regard, Benitez is not wrong.

But in the world of professional football, results rule.

Whether you do it right or not, as long as the result is wrong, you must be wrong!

The same is true for Real Madrid today.

Benitez's zone-marking defense system is too complicated. There are both zone defense and man-marking. How to define, how to switch effectively, how to work as a team... Too many problems are all pushed to Real Madrid players at once. before.

So sometimes it can be seen that Real Madrid conceded the ball in just a few minutes, because the team was caught off guard by the opponent in a very short period of time, and it was messed up.

In response to this situation, the coaching staff could not come up with a more effective way, and could only repeatedly emphasize training and running-in.

How could it be possible to completely resolve the stagnation accumulated over the past few years in just a few months?

What's more, whether it is Ramos, Pepe or Fermaelen, they are all young players, and they are not calm enough in experience.

However, in this post-Christmas training, Benitez and Yesterdam still came up with some new measures.

In the afternoon's tactical training, Benitez arranged the team into two groups, each with ten people.

When the coaches move anywhere on the field, they will pass the ball in their hands to each other, and when the ball reaches a coach, ten players on the field will quickly approach the coach and press him.

At the same time, Benitez, Yesterdam and others will closely observe the team's formation on the sidelines, especially focusing on the players' positional changes, whether the overall formation remains compact and orderly, and whether there is compression between the three lines Empty...

Once a player makes a mistake, Benitez will stop the first time and immediately go over to give guidance.

Obviously, this is a brand-new training method that Benitez thought about during the Christmas period, the purpose is to help Real Madrid players get familiar with and implement his zone-marking defense system as soon as possible.

In addition, Benitez has also made a lot of preparations, giving the players a tactical lesson every day, hoping to improve the players' tactical understanding and tactical literacy on the pitch as soon as possible.

Yang Yang, Xavi Alonso, Abeloa and Mascherano are all old ministers of Benitez during his time at Liverpool. They also know a lot about the team's defensive system. Analyze and explain with teammates.

And Pepe's injury made Benitez decide to put Abeloa at the right back and let Ramos return to the center back to partner with Fermaelen. Although these two center backs are not tall and have limited air defense capabilities, However, the maneuverability is very strong, the range of activities is large, and the skills of the feet are also very good, but it is another combination.

However, the specific effect still needs to be tested in practice.

…………

…………

On January 2, La Liga was back in flames.

Barcelona played against Villarreal. With Pedro scoring at the opening, Villarreal tragically equalized the score in the second half, and finally drew a one-to-one home draw against the Yellow Submarines.

The next day, Real Madrid challenged Osasuna away.

Real Madrid had an overwhelming advantage in the away game, but after 90 minutes of hard work, they still failed to break Osasuna's goal, and finally brought back one point from the away game 0-0.

The team was disappointed with this result, because everyone originally hoped to take advantage of the chance of Barcelona dropping points to further expand their lead. After all, they will face a two-line battle in the Champions League next.

For Real Madrid this season, the Champions League is crucial.

Because the Champions League final is at the Bernabeu!

...

In the middle of the week, the Copa del Rey round of 16.

Real Madrid played against Athletic Santander at home, Benitez played with half the main and half substitute lineup, and the result was a 2-2 draw at home.

In the 56th and 61st minutes of the second half, two goals were conceded in just five minutes.

Real Madrid's defensive ability has once again been questioned by the media.

...

Weekend, the seventeenth round of La Liga.

Real Madrid welcomes Real Mallorca at home.

Yang Yang received an assist from Sneijder in the seventh minute of the game, opening the scoring for the team.

At the beginning of the second half, Real Madrid attacked again, and Yang Yang assisted Ibrahimovic to score.

In the end, Real Madrid beat Real Mallorca 2-0 at home.

However, it was also in this round that Barcelona beat Tenerife 5-0 away.

Messi scored a hat-trick in this game, successfully chasing his La Liga goals this season to 13 goals, only one goal behind Yang Yang, surpassing David Villa and Zlatan Ibrahimovic. strange.

This also makes people feel the outbreak of Messi.

...

Three days later, the second round of the Copa del Rey round of 16 knockout matches.

Real Madrid once again drew Santander 0-0 in the away game, and the total score was 2-2, but unfortunately they were eliminated because of the away goal, which immediately caused the outside media to question again.

Fortunately, Barcelona was also 1-2 at home and 1-0 away, with a total score of 2-2. However, the away goals scored few and they were eliminated by Sevilla.

But after the winter break, Real Madrid has not been able to find a state, which has become a concern for everyone.