Glory Greenery

Chapter 602 Champions League opponent: Barcelona

Champions League promotion, Yang Mo won the best of the month.

Except that Ibrahimovic's injury caught Manchester City by surprise, Manchester City performed very well in the first half of March.

After advancing to the quarter-finals of the Champions League and before the draw for the quarter-finals, on March 3, Manchester City ushered in the 15th round of the league at home.

Because of the previous English League Cup finals and the top 8 of the FA Cup, the 28th and 29th rounds of the league were collectively postponed.

In this league, Manchester City's opponents have been promoted to Hull City.

Sitting at home and playing against a newly promoted team, of course it is impossible for Manchester City to go wrong.

2-0, Yang Mo and Aguero each scored a goal to help Manchester City win easily.

In this game, Pellegrini replaced Yang Mo in the second half after leading 2-0 in the first half.

Obviously, at the end of the season, Pellegrini's use of Yang Mo was still conservative.

Maybe it was Ibrahimovic's injury that frightened Pellegrini, and the old coach became more and more precious to Yang Mo.

After all, Manchester City can persist even after Ibrahimovic is injured. The combination of Yang Mo and Aguero's blue wings has also killed opponents in fear.

But once Yang Mo is injured, Manchester City will not have to play the next game. Aguero can't fly even if he wants to fly alone.

And Aguero's physical condition is not good, Pellegrini must use it carefully, after all, the players are too tired this season.

Ibrahimovic's injury is also inseparable from physical fatigue.

After getting the 28th unbeaten record of the season, on March 3, the draw for the quarter-finals of the Champions League finally arrived.

At the Carrington base, the first group of matchups drawn by the head of UEFA made the players who came to watch the draw sigh loudly.

Because Manchester City drew an opponent they least want to see in the quarterfinals, Barcelona.

Although Barcelona was swept by Bayern last season, no one can deny the strength of Barcelona.

After the introduction of Neymar with a huge sum of money this season, although the transfer of black gold made Barcelona's upper echelons embarrassed, the enhancement Neymar brought to Barcelona is still visible to the naked eye.

After Zlatan Ibrahimovic's injury, against such a Barcelona, ​​even Manchester City can hardly guarantee a certain victory.

However, at this stage of the Champions League, it is already impossible to encounter soft persimmons in the knockout rounds.

So for Manchester City, instead of lamenting bad luck, it is better to prepare well. After all, there is not much time left before the first match of the top 8.

But the only thing that can comfort Manchester City is a schedule that starts with the host and then the guest.

After he was the first to be drawn, everyone in Manchester City watched the next three sets of draws.

The results are, Manchester United VS Bayern, Real Madrid VS Dortmund, Chelsea VS Atletico Madrid, all strong duels.

However, because UEFA canceled the upper and lower half of the quarter-finals in the Champions League this season, Manchester City has no way to determine the range of opponents in the semi-finals before the quarter-finals end.

We can only wait for the top 4 to be released, and then watch the UEFA draw.

When the new UEFA rules were released, the media could interpret them as measures against Manchester City.

But now it seems that it is actually the same which one Manchester City draws.

After the end of the UEFA Champions League draw, just one day later, on March 3, Manchester City once again ushered in a league game at home.

In the 31st round of the league, the opponent is still a newly promoted team, Fulham.

Compared with Hull City, which they played against before, Fulham's performance after coming to the Premier League can only be described as a mess. They only won 7 games in [-] league rounds, and they are firmly seated in the position of Premier League deputy squad leader.

For Pellegrini, despite Fulham's poor results, they must not be careless.

In the Premier League, relegation teams are recognized as more difficult to play than mid-range teams. In order to stay in the Premier League, these teams can often explode with unimaginable combat effectiveness.

Therefore, Manchester City put out a full lineup to avoid capsizing in the gutter.

And when the game started, although Fulham did not take the initiative to attack, but the look of being unable to defend was obviously aware of the strength gap between them and Manchester City, and was ready to defend a draw. A point is a point. .

It is a pity that Manchester City did not give Fulham a chance to defend.

To be precise, Yang Mo didn't want to waste too much time on the court.

At the end of the third and 10 minutes of the first half, Yang Mo took advantage of a cross run with Aguero to completely spread out Fulham's defense line, and finally entered the penalty area to complete the goal.

In the 41st minute, after Yang Mo was brought down by Fulham players when he broke through, the referee awarded Yang Mo a free kick.

After "negotiation", the free kick was taken by Yang Mo himself.

Run-up, force, free throw, after a beautiful arc, Yang Mo's direct free kick went in!
It is not common to see Yang Mo score a direct free kick in the league.

Although Yang Mo's free kick is still beautiful and standard like a textbook, it still lacks the murderous spirit of those masters, but the Fulham goalkeeper's poor save made the goal finally go in.

Like Hull City before, at the end of the first half, Manchester City took a two-goal lead.

In the second half, Pellegrini continued to rotate, and Yang Mo and Aguero were replaced in the second half.

But after Aguero was replaced in the 77th minute, Fulham suddenly relied on a goal after a counterattack, which shocked Pellegrini into a cold sweat.

After that, Fulham took all the offense and almost cost Manchester City the victory.

Fortunately, after the Manchester City players realized that the situation was wrong, they decisively shrunk their focus, which prevented Fulham from continuing to score.

After the game, Pellegrini also said in an interview with reporters that his rotation was a bit careless.

If either Yang Mo or Aguero were on the field, Fulham would never dare to attack unscrupulously.

But in any case, after the 2-1 narrow victory, Manchester City continued their unbeaten record this season to 29 games.

The Premier League this season is only 9 games away from the end.

Manchester City is only 9 games away from becoming the second unbeaten team to win the championship after becoming Arsenal.

Before that, some Manchester City fans and media also said that Manchester City is very likely to win the championship with an unbeaten record.

But because it was still early before the end of the league, everyone only mentioned it and did not publicize it.

But now it is different. Seeing that the season is coming to an end, Manchester City is very likely to create such a miracle.

Moreover, Arsenal's unbeaten championship record in the 03/04 season was 26 wins and 12 draws.

But this season, Manchester City has won 29 of the 24 games they have played, and only 5 draws.

This kind of dominance is much stronger than that of Arsenal at that time.

And counting last season, Manchester City's unbeaten record has reached 34 games. As long as Manchester City can really win the championship with an unbeaten record, it is not impossible to break Arsenal's 49 unbeaten record in the Premier League.

However, in order to achieve such an achievement, Manchester City must first break through the next series of strong enemies.

In the next game, the 29th round of the supplementary match, Manchester City will play away against Manchester United.

And immediately followed by the second top game of the season, the match against Arsenal in the 32nd round.

After the league match with Arsenal ended, Manchester City finished playing Annampton. In the 34th round of the league, they will face Yang Mo's most hated opponent, Liverpool.

Not counting the Champions League and FA Cup matches, in less than 20 days, they have encountered three rivals in succession, and whether they can create the myth of unbeaten record and win the championship depends on Manchester City's performance in these three games.

(End of this chapter)