Chapter 226: A relatively low-key expedition

For Manchester United, Chelsea and Leiden Oriental, the days ahead will be very severe. I won’t mention the strict schedule. The unfavorable situation on both fronts has put them under great pressure. However, for teams that want to win honors, it is impossible to be without pressure. They are crushed by pressure and work hard for a season in vain. Only by holding on to the huge pressure and winning what they want can they deserve the title and honor of the championship.

However, what makes Chelsea and Leiden Oriental even more furious is that the FA once again announced that Manchester United's away game against Blackburn was postponed to May, while the fatigued Chelsea and Leiden Oriental will participate in the league on April 10th. Compared with the Winners' Cup, the FA cares more about the results in the Champions League, and Manchester United, who did not lose, seems to be more likely to enter the final than Chelsea and Leiden Oriental who lost...

The angry Chelsea and Leiden Oriental demonstrated their resilience and psychological adjustment ability. They defeated Wimbledon and Middlesbrough away respectively, and they also received rewards. Leeds United drew with Liverpool in this round, leaving only one point in the lead over Chelsea, and was left by Leiden Oriental by four points.

On April 13, in the Premier League, Chelsea played away against Middlesbrough, Leiden Oriental challenged West Ham United away, and Manchester United played away against Liverpool.

Chelsea, mainly veterans, were finally dragged down by the schedule. At the Riverside Stadium, they not only did not gain any advantage, but were instead beaten by the physically fit Middlesbrough players. If it weren't for the goalkeeper De Huye's brave performance, they would definitely not get a point but a failure.

However, Leiden Oriental, which is mainly young players, has stubbornly survived the most difficult period. The veteran is in a stable state, but he can only choose to allocate reasonably in terms of physical fitness. Young players can often surpass the limit when they reach the limit - because they are young and because they can still grow.

One to zero, Van Nie's goal allowed Leiden East to take three points away from Upton Park Stadium, leading Chelsea and Leeds United to reach seven points. Although one more game than the opponent, the points tied Arsenal, who also had one less game, and one point ahead of Manchester United, who tied with Liverpool in this round.

There was no chance to breathe. Four days later, Leiden East faced the challenge of Leeds United. Leeds United, which was replenishing, took a point from Brisbane Road Stadium with Hasselbainke's goal. Xiao Ming was quite satisfied with this point. After all, Leeds United's performance this season is almost at its peak. It is still entangled with the top teams. It proves their strength. The players' performance is also very good. Failure to win is also due to luck. There is no need to be harsh. Chelsea tied again in this round. With only a few rounds left in the league, they are leading the two Champions League competitors with the biggest qualification, seven points. At least they don't have to worry too much about losing their qualifications for the Champions League.

Manchester United and Arsenal won again, Arsenal ranked first with 68 points, Manchester United jumped to second place with 67 points, Leiden Oriental ranked third with 66 points in more than 66 points, and gradually was slowly broken by the two opponents ahead.

Although they are only one point and two points behind their opponents, the hope of Leighton Oriental, who has one more game, has become very slim. Even if they can win all the remaining four rounds of the league, they still have to expect Manchester United and Arsenal to only get tens of the remaining five league games - this is because Arsenal's goal difference is only three more than Leighton Oriental. If Manchester United leads Leighton Oriental, with their advantage of twelve goals exceeding Leighton Oriental, Leighton Oriental has to pray that Manchester United will lose two games in the subsequent game.

A strong team is a strong team, and a champion is a champion. The more you are in this cruel pursuit, the more you can show the psychological quality advantages of the team that has won the championship. The three teams that have not won the championship since the founding of the Premier League have begun to gradually fall behind. Leeds United paid the price for not grabbing enough points before, and Chelsea paid the price for the aging of their main lineup. Although Leiden Oriental is still trying hard to catch up and not fall behind, it has also begun to gradually show the trend of not continuing.

In this case, Leiden East ushered in the second leg of the Winners Cup semi-finals.

Before this game, Manchester United, who was highly expected by the FA and even withstood the huge dissatisfaction of other teams, opened the door to facilitate a miraculous reversal!

Juventus, who is at home and has an advantage in his away goal, seems full of confidence after the start of the game, and there is basically no hope in the league. They want to enter next season's European arena, only by winning the Champions League can they continue to appear in the Champions League. Under this pressure, Juventus, who has been performing poorly since the beginning of this season, burst out with great strength.

Just six minutes into the game, Inzaghi received a corner kick from Zidane at the back point to beat Gary. Neville broke through the goal guarded by Schmeichel. In the eleventh minute, Inzaghi, who was ridiculed by some media as "dribbling cannot exceed five meters", showed his technical ability. After humiliating Stam in high-speed dribbling, he cleverly pushed the ball twice. Juventus 2-0 at home, leading Manchester United 3-1 in the total score!

To some extent, this is a desperate score. No one has ever counted how many Manchester United fans fell cups or other objects when they were two goals behind. However, at that moment, countless Manchester United fans felt despair deeply, which is for sure.

If it weren't for Keane, if it weren't for this fighting spirit leader, maybe Manchester United would have ended like last season. Fortunately, they had Keane and a captain who would never lose his fighting spirit at any time.

In the 24th minute, an ordinary corner kick.

Beckham took the penalty, Keane shook Ferrara's defense while running, and then a lion shook his head, and the ball was in a dead corner, one to two!

Seeing hope, Manchester United came alive, Beckham began to make a long pass, Giggs began to break through, Manchester United's midfielder was alive, and the entire team began to live.

Ten minutes later, Giggs made a cross from the wing, York broke through Yuliano's defense and headed the ball at close range, 2-2! This score was enough to allow them to go to Camp Nou to participate in the Champions League final!

This time, Juventus was forced to a dead end. They began to attack fiercely, Zidane, Davis, Dilivio, Conte, Inzagi... They began to bomb Manchester United's penalty area in turn, but Manchester United's defense line united to withstand Juventus' counterattack!

Among them, Inzaghi's shot in the second half was the most dangerous. Inzaghi's shot in the counterattack had already crossed Schmeichel's body, but was pushed out by Stam, who returned to the defense, in front of the goal line - this clearance was worth 20 million US dollars!

Manchester United, who withstood the opponent's bombardment, secured the victory before the end of the game. Beckham, who returned to the midfielder, sent an accurate long pass. Andy Kerr made a single shot and locked the total score to four-3. Manchester United completed a three-goal reversal away and advanced to the Champions League final!

After the game, Manchester United fans were excited, and the FA officials also breathed a sigh of relief - Manchester United deserved their favor. After a long dark period in the European arena, the FA and League Committee hopes to have a Premier League team that dominated Europe like Liverpool, so that the Premier League can rebuild its position in Europe!

After the Heisel massacre, the English team never achieved decent results in Europe. After 1985, the teams that dominated Europe came from Italy, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands... and even the Bucharest stars in Romania, Porto of Portugal and Belgrade of Yugoslavia were all the top stars in the Champions League, but the Premier League team has not even entered the Champions League final for the entire fourteen years! This time, it may be an opportunity for the Premier League team to rise again.

While England was cheering for Manchester United's feat, Chelsea and Leiden Oriental set out in a relatively low-key manner.

Chelsea rushed to Rome to challenge Lazio. The result of a one-to-two loss at home made them look very slim. Leiden East was waiting for Mallorca's challenge at home. The loss of one away goal made their situation seem better than Chelsea. However, considering that Mallorca, who was coached by Cooper, conceded the least goals in La Liga this season and the fact that the average game is less than one goal, the goal behind is probably even harder to catch up!

But for Xiao Ming, he would never give up this game easily. Since he has basically obtained the qualification for the Champions League next season in a series of arduous battles, it is not a time to breathe a sigh of relief. Whether it is the Winners Cup or the League champion, he will definitely attack if he can attack!

This is not the time to train new players, nor is it any garbage time. Instead, the most important month of the whole season, if you can enter the finals of the Winners Cup, Leiden Oriental has five games left to play throughout the season, but if you cannot enter the finals of the Winners Cup, there are only four games left. Whether it is five or four games, it is not something that Leiden Oriental players cannot bear.

Brisbane Road Stadium on April 22.

Nearly 5,000 Mallorca fans came to London across the ocean to cheer for their beloved team. As a small team with a home capacity of only 28,000, being able to come to the UK to cheer for them proves how outstanding their performance has been recently.

"In a way, these two teams are very similar... Four seasons ago, Leiden East was just an English-Central team, and three seasons ago, Mallorca was still working hard in the Spanish Second Division. Xiao Ming's arrival made Leiden East create a series of miracles, while Cooper's arrival made Mallorca quickly become a strong La Liga team. This season, he even stayed in the La Liga standings for several weeks. In his first confrontation, Mallorca defeated Leiden East 1-0 at home. However, with Leiden East's offensive ability, this goal does not seem to be a hindrance. In the past games, their average home goal was 2.7, and their offensive power was quite strong."

In the espn's preview, the commentator commented that many media supported Leiden Oriental's performance in the European arena. Two seasons ago, when they were still English League One team, they reached the quarterfinals in the League Cup, and this season they also passed the hurdles and entered the semi-finals of the Winners Cup. For a team that had no experience in European competitions before, it has done enough.

In fact, after March, all the criticisms against Leiden Oriental have disappeared because the performance of this team has left the most demanding people speechless. In the battle between Manchester United and Arsenal, they supported it. Although they are now ranked third, they still have a chance to win the championship and have basically been qualified for the Champions League next season. In such a cruel schedule, even veteran teams like Leeds and Chelsea have fallen behind. They are still stubbornly following, and have become one of the only remaining teams in the European arena. Is there any team that can do so well in the first top season?

Even Kaiserslautern, who created miracles last season, gave up the cup from the beginning and did not have European competitions, so they were able to win the league championship in the relatively less fierce Bundesliga. What about this season? They have been spinning outside the top three. After entering the quarterfinals of the Champions League, they were humiliated by Bayern in two rounds of 6-0...

Although it is not certain that if Kaiserslautern had European competition tasks last season, he would have done less than Leiden Oriental, even so, Leiden Oriental's performance is enough to make everyone admire him - this kind of admiration is based on the status of a new team in Leiden Oriental. If other teams that were originally in the top league were replaced, it might not cause such a surprise.

"Before the game, let's close our eyes and think about it. This season, we have scored more than one goal on many teams with solid defense... Think about how we scored two goals at Highbury and Stamford Bridge, and think about how we scored three goals on this court... That's right, Mallorca's defense is very stable, and Cooper also used tactics that surprised me in the last game... But this doesn't scare us, we have to score goals! One, two, and even more! Kill Mallorca and we are the ones who enter the finals!"

"Kill Mallorca!" The players all shouted. They were very tired. Their physical reserves had been almost exhausted, but their fighting spirit was more enthusiastic than the hot!

So what if you lose in the first game? So what if you fail to score a goal away? We can still win! We can score three goals in Manchester United, and three four or even more goals in Mallorca! Now, can we give up easily? Fight to the fullest!

In this game, Xiao Ming made an adjustment to the starting lineup, but this adjustment was something Cooper never expected.

Gerald started, but he replaced Boban, but Phillips!

Leiden East's formation is not four or four, but four or five!

When he got the starting lineup of Leiden East, Cooper, with gray hair on his head, suddenly frowned. He originally thought it was a smoke bomb released by Xiao Ming, but when the starting lineup was not changed two hours before the game started, he meant that Xiao Ming was playing the real thing!

Temporary change of formation? Is this young man, who is the chairman and head coach, really a layman as the Spanish media commented?

But Cooper didn't believe it if he was killed. A layman could lead the team to bite the two top Manchester United and Arsenal in the league, and also lead the team to the semi-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup at the same time. If he is really a layman, either his luck is particularly good, or the team he led is already strong enough to ignore the head coach's on-the-spot command!

But both possibilities are impossible - luck cannot last for a season, especially in a pure knockout match that cannot be lost in a single game. Although Leiden Oriental has many international players, they will never surpass other giants in overall strength. You should know that those giants rely not only on a certain star, but on overall strength!

"Is it a trick that is too stressed?" Cooper thought hard. Even the best coach is likely to use tricks under pressure. Cooper is more willing to believe that Xiao Ming is a talented young man. Because of pressure and experience, he chose to change the lineup temporarily before such an important game!

The difference between 442 and 451 is not just the difference between multiple forwards and few forwards, but also a habit problem. After playing for a season, the formation suddenly changed greatly. No matter how outstanding the players are, they will feel at a loss. The test of Leiden East in this game is more about offense, but about defense - because they did not get away goals! As long as Mallorca scores one goal, they have to score three to eliminate Mallorca!

Thinking of this, Cooper felt relieved. Perhaps, this game was not as difficult as he had imagined in advance. It was Mallorca's luck to meet such a relatively young opponent.

However, among the coaches in the semi-finals of the League Cup, in addition to himself and Lazio's Eriksen, the head coaches of the other two Premier League teams seem to be novices. Only the Premier League will allow these people who do not even get the coaching qualification certificate to serve as club head coaches!
Chapter completed!