Many reports use "crisis" to describe Millwall's situation.

As a newly promoted team, the most important thing to face is the decline in the results brought by the depth of the bench. Every season, weak teams will play well at the beginning, and the results will drop sharply once the league has passed half.

This is a common problem.

Many teams with good results in the first half have similar situations. The only thing they don’t have is three teams: Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool. Even Arsenal cannot be said to be. In recent seasons, there have been only three teams, Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool, with similar results in the first and second half.

Chelsea and Manchester United have always had good results, and occasionally they will play better and better.

Liverpool has always been very ordinary.

Arsenal also has some bench depth issues, and their results will begin to decline whenever the schedule is halfway through.

Millwall?

Of course the situation will be even worse!

The media didn't have to think too much about it and came to this conclusion. In fact, this is not ironic. Those teams whose names are not mentioned have always been bad, and they can't play well in the first half, so there is no way to talk about the decline in the results.

Millwall is eligible to be talked about because they rank second in the league and have definitely achieved very good results so far.

Whether the teams with good results in the first half of the year will decline in the second half depends on the team's background. To put it directly, it is the depth of the bench. On the contrary, teams like Manchester United will have better and better results in the later stages of the league. Manchester United rarely have very good results in the start of the game, but they are qualified to compete for the championship every year. Many teams that have outstanding performance at the start of the game will slowly fall after the middle of the league and are overtaken by these wealthy families with backgrounds.

This has become something that has become a 'rule'.

Millwall is incorporated into the law.

Charlton became Millwall's "Brother in Trouble", and the two teams were mentioned together. Charlton's performance was also very good, ranking fourth in the league in the first eight rounds with five wins, two draws and one loss, only three points less than Millwall and Manchester United.

The London regional media are constantly analyzing this point, and the Guardian and Manchester Sports also joined. The reason why the latter two media joined is very simple: Millwall and Charlton are both London regional teams. As major media in Manchester regional, they will naturally join the ranks of criticizing London regional teams.

These reports sound unpleasant.

But it has to be admitted that the report content is very real, most teams do have this problem, and Millwall's bench depth is difficult to support the entire season. In the last game with Manchester City, rotation was also the key reason for the draw.

Fortunately, the report did not affect Mirwall fans. Perhaps it was the result of Zhang Yang's "low-key" situation. Mirwall fans all believed that the team's goal was to relegate. As long as they could complete the relegation, they would be very satisfied. As for what the media said about the decline in the results, they had already been prepared.

There are still some players in Mirwall's team discussing, especially those players who are "replenishing the bench" in depth. Even if they know the gap between themselves and the main players, they can be directly denied and their strength is unhappy.

The training of these players has become more active. They hope to become the main force one day, rather than the "negative strength" that has been kept by the media without even mentioning the name.

A week later, Miller ushered in a new event - the English League Cup.

The history of the English League Cup is very interesting.

This event was initiated by the Football League, which was founded in 1886. They were originally in charge of all 92 professional clubs in England. However, in 1992, after the 20 teams in the English League One were "rebelled" and established a parallel super league, there were only 72 clubs left under its sanctions. Since the clubs under its jurisdiction were not the highest, the weight of speaking was naturally not as good as before. If you want the Premier League clubs to participate in the League Cup, it naturally depends on the face of others. The League Cup became even more lonely and even less than the FA Cup.

The League Cup is originally ranked behind the Premier League and the FA Cup. For top Premier League clubs, the League Cup is just a game to train substitutes.

For these clubs, it is a helpless move to ignore the League Cup, because in addition to participating in the league, FA Cup, and League Cup, they also have to participate in the lucrative UEFA Champions League or the UEFA Cup. If they have good results, they can reach nearly 70 games in nine months in a season, and an average of nearly two games a week. No team can withstand such a intensive schedule. Therefore, some top teams will send a large number of bench players and even youth troops to participate in the game.

The Premier League mid-range clubs have not had the strength to win the league championship for a long time. They can win the League Cup championship without paying attention to it to boost morale, and also regard it as the second way to qualify for the UEFA Cup.

Some small and medium clubs can use the League Cup to get the opportunity to fight against strong teams, and use all to go to TV and newspapers, which can not only obtain tickets and TV broadcast revenue, but also expand its influence.

So the League Cup is a stage with multiple mentalities.

Millwall's mentality can only be "training". In the eyes of the public, Millwall is just a relegation team. If you can win the League Cup, try your best to win it. However, Zhang Yang's goal is to lead the team in the top four. Even if he only participates in the Premier League, Millwall's bench depth is a bit urgent, let alone participate in the Cup. Zhang Yang decided early.

When he officially joined the League Cup and met his first opponent, Rotherham, Zhang Yang only sent a substitute lineup - a 442-system starter.

The starting player is considered the main player, only Joey Healy and Livermore, and all other positions are substitutes.

The goalkeeper was replaced by Graham Stark.

The two forwards are Neal Harris and Valdy, and Curtis Weston also got the starter, playing the right forward to replace Josh Simpson.

It is said that it is training, it is training.

Zhang Yang must carefully observe Vardy's performance in the game. This is the first time Vardy appears for Mirwall. He is a player that Zhang Yang values ​​very much, but he is still a little younger, so it is hard to say whether he can play it in a short time.

Vardy is a difficult player.

For example, Darren Bent is very easy to play. He can also play as a full-time forward and can compete in multiple positions such as left, right forward, center, and full-time forward. It is too easy to play.

Braniff and Valdy are both players who can only play forwards. It’s not that they can’t play other positions, but their performance will be affected if they change positions.

Curtis Weston is better. He has always been the team's substitute. When he was promoted to the first team last season, Wise had already let him change the frontcourt position continuously. The left and right forwards and central forwards are what he is good at, but Zhang Yang asked him to try to play for the forward.

It is necessary to use the League Cup to observe the performance of players, especially Weston, Vardy and several defenders. When they always play as the main lineup, they have some inaccurate judgments about the performance of substitutes. The data of "Yingling Divination" and "Yingling Calculation" are not unique. The data seems to be very accurate. But football has never been able to tell everything by data. If they are not strong enough, they may not be able to perform well. Some players are very strong, but when they are on the court, they always do not perform well. On the contrary, some players are game-type players and can perform well whenever they appear.

During this League Cup, Zhang Yang carefully observed the performance of several players, and he also asked Wise to take a closer look to make a reasonable judgment on the players' appearance performance.

Curtis Weston performed well. He played as a right forward, showed speed and good cooperation in the game. He had a long pass and gave Livermore a chance, who shot directly with one shot to help Millwall break through the goal.

Vardy's performance is surprising.

Most people are not optimistic about Vardy. When the media analyzed Mirwall's lineup, they would not even mention Vardy's name. Many people think that Vardy just bought it and put it into the youth team for training when she saw that she had potential.

This is already a high point.

Previously, Vardy only played for one non-professional league team. The regional leagues that Mirwall youth team participated were much higher than that. It is rare for a young player from a non-professional league to have the chance to play in a Premier League team.

As for what performance can be performed? It’s like the opening broadcast of Mike Johnson’s doubts, “Vardy appears? Zhang Yang probably wants to give up the League Cup…”

Vardy's performance was not as bad as expected.

Although Vardy did not score a goal in the whole game, he did a good job in cooperation with his teammates and there were no major problems in the game. The summary data is used to illustrate: 41 touches, 32 passes, 2 steals, 3 shots, 1 shot, and 0 goals.

This data is actually a bit bad.

If Braniff and Darren Bent play such data, Zhang Yang will consider removing them from the main position, but for a substitute forward, it is a qualified data. Even Neil Harris is only slightly better than Vardy's data.

That's all.

Neil Harris shot four times, only shot directly once, and did not score.

It was very surprising that Vardy could perform like this. Even Wise was surprised to agree, "This guy may be such a genius!" You should know that a few months ago, Vardy only played for the amateur league team. In that amateur team, he was not the absolute main player, but only occasionally played for the team.

It is incredible to catch up with Millwall's marginal substitute now.

Zhang Yang nodded with satisfaction.

In my past memory, Valdy would come to Lescott City to play and become one of England's top scorers, but that was after 2010. It was still too early. After joining Millwall, Valdy received professional training in advance and received guidance from a group of high-level teammates. In addition to the influence of the atmosphere in the team, his improvement speed has accelerated a lot.

"Maybe Vardy can become famous early." Zhang Yang was a little excited when he thought about it. It was caused by the butterfly effect he brought, which was almost equivalent to changing the future.

Have you... done a change in the future?

How interesting!

In the end, Millwall defeated Rotherham 2-1 at home to win this League Cup.

Zhang Yang felt a little regretful.

In fact, Zhang Yang's consideration is to lose to his opponent early, so the team does not have to consider the League Cup. After defeating his opponent, he said he would participate in the next round of the game, but it also has benefits. He can continue to use the game to train.

"In the next League Cup, continue to send all substitutes!"

Zhang Yang made a decision again.

After playing the League Cup, Millwall could not rest. The next round of league is only three days apart. The opponent is Middlesbrough led by McLaren, a very troublesome team. They are called the "big-game killers". The league ranking is only in the middle, but when playing against strong teams, they can burst out with high fighting spirit. For example, they drew against Liverpool, defeated Arsenal, and lost to Tottenham and Charlton with a big score.

This is an opponent with ups and downs.

The League Cup did not interrupt the league, and there were still many media outside the world who continued to use the gimmick of "Milwall Performance Analysis" to attract readers' attention while also looking at Millwall's league results.

When Millwall met Middlesbrough, many media began to be optimistic about Middlesbrough.

Zhang Yang is very familiar with the British media routines.

Whenever a team performs well, that is, when it achieves surprising results, the media will start to analyze variously. If they follow the team to analyze "good results", there will definitely be few people who are willing to watch it. However, if the analysis "not good results" can attract many readers.

Their analysis makes sense in some respects.

Millwall's bench depth problem is indeed very serious, even worse than Charlton, who is "Brother of Hardship". When a substitute player appears, his strength is simply incomparable to the main lineup. If he encounters a major injury problem, it will be the end of the day.

Even so, Zhang Yang was still very unhappy.

Before the match against Middlesbrough, Zhang Yang said 's sincerely' at the press conference, "Before the game, many people said that we will encounter a crisis because our bench depth is limited. Yes, I admit, I would like to thank everyone for the reminder. If it weren't for you, I really didn't notice this problem. This is a big problem. The opponents in the Premier League are too strong. Every game we have been very difficult. Now we are facing a crisis."

When they heard Zhang Yang's words, the reporters in the audience were a little confused.

Even though many media reports have analyzed the possible crisis problems caused by Millwall's bench depth, shouldn't it be normal for the team's head coach to refute it?

At least I would like to say a few words to encourage morale? Why did I admit it directly?

The script is wrong!

The regional media in Middlesbrough do not have so many feelings. They think that Zhang Yang is showing weakness because Millwall has no confidence in defeating Middlesbrough.

Middlesbrough’s performance is not as good as Millwall, but they are traditional Premier League powerhouses after all, and they draw with Liverpool and defeat Arsenal in the front, which brought great fighting spirit to the team.

Middlesbrough can perform well when facing strong teams.

Millwall...is he considered a strong team, right?

They rank second in the league!

So if nothing unexpected happens in this game, Middlesbrough will definitely win, and the other side's coach's statement is understandable.

Middlesbrough regional media reporters were all very happy.

But when ninety minutes ended, their smiles froze on their faces, and the numbers on the scoreboard almost blinded their eyes-4:1, Millwall defeated Middlesbrough with a big score at home.
To be continued...